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Given By
TJ, a STTPT. OF DOCimTENTS
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INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE
SAN FRANCISCO AREA- Part 1
HEARING
BEFORE THE
COMMITTEE ON UN-AMEEICAN ACTIVITIES
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIYES
EIGHTY-THIKD CONGEESS
FIRST SESSION
DECEMBER 1, 1953
Printed for the use of the Committee on Un-American Activities
INCLUDING INDEX
y
UNITED STATES , I "/ t/-3
GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
41002 WASHINGTON : 1954
^r-\'^
Boston Public Library
Superintond^nt of Documents
COMMITTEE ON UN-AMERICAN ACTIVITIES
United States House of Representatives
HAROLD H. VELDE, Illinois, Chairman
BERNARD W. KEARNEY, New Yorlc FRANCIS E. WALTER, Pennsylvania
DONALD L. JACKSON, California MORGAN M. MOULDER, Missouri
KIT CLARDY, Michigan CLYDE DOYLE, California
GORDON H. SCHERBR, Ohio JAMES B. PRAZIER, JR., Tennessee
Robert L. Kunzig, Counsel
Frank S. Tavenneu, Jr., Counsel
LOUIS J. Russell, Chief Investiyator
Thomas W. Bealb, Sr., Chief Clerk
Raphael I. Nixon, Director of Research
II
CONTENTS
December 1, 1953, testimony of — P«tt
Lou Rosser 3067
Donald Niven Wheeler 3138
Index _ __- 3153
EXHIBITS
Rosser Exhibit No. 1. — New Frontiers, 1937, published by the Young Com-
munist League (retained in committee files).
Rosser Exhibit No. 2. — Two Decades, published by the Communist Partv,
September 1939 (.see pp. 3059 and 3060).
Rosser Exhibit No. 3. — The Young Communist League Lantern, news sheet
dated December 9, 1938 (see p. 3062).
Rosser Exhibit No. 4. — New York Herald Tribune, June 14, 1932, page 16,
article, "22 Negroes Sail Today to Work on Soviet Film," (see pp. 3064 and
3065).
Rosser Exhibit No. 5. — San Francisco Workers' School, announcement of courses
spring term, May 31, 1934 (see pp. 3074-3078).
Rosser Exhibit No. 6. — "Why Communism?" pamphlet by M. J. Olgin (retained
in committee files).
Rosser Exhibit No. 7. — Young Communists in Action, pamphlet published in
1934 by the Young Communist League (retained in committee files).
Rosser Exhibit No. 8. — The Communist, May 1934, pages 444 and 445, resolu-
tion of the eighth national convention of the Communist Party, Cleveland,
Ohio, April 2-8, 1934 (see p. 3099).
Rosser Exhibit No. 9. — Communist Party of Los Angeles County resolutions
and proposals adopted at convention, March 27 and 28, 1937 (see pp. 3106-
3111).
Rosser Exhibit No. 10. — Communist Party of California, proceedings of conven-
tion, May 14 and 15, 1938 (see pp. 3112 and 3113).
Donald Niven Wheeler Exhibit No. 1. — San Francisco Call-Bulletin, November
18, 1953, page 9, article entitled, "Dairy Farmer Scores Listing as Spy Suspect"
(see p. 3143).
m
Public Law 601, 79th Congress
The legislation under which the House Committee on Un-American
Activities operates is Public Law 601, 79th Congress [1946], chapter
753, 2d session, which provides :
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States
of America in Congress assembled, * * *
PART 2— RULES OF THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
Rule X
SEC. 121. STANDING COMMITTEES
*******
17. Committee on Un-American Activities, to consist of nine members.
Rule XI
POWERS AND DUTIES OF COMMITTEES
***•**•
(q) (1) Committee on Un-American Activities.
(A) Un-American activities.
(2) The Committee on Un-American Activities, as a wtiole or by subcommittee,
is authorized to make from time to time investigations of (i) the extent,
character, and objects of un-American propaganda activities in the United States,
(ii) the diffusion within the United States of subversive and un-American propa-
ganda that is instigated from foreign countries or of a domestic origin and attacks
the principle of the form of government as guaranteed by our Constitution, and
(iii) all other questions in relation thereto that would aid Congress in any nec-
essary remedial legislation.
The Committee on Un-American Activities shall report to the House (or to the
Clerk of the House if the House is not in session) the results of any such investi-
gation, together with such recommendations as it deems advisable.
For the purpose of any such investigation, the Committee on Un-American
Activities, or any subcommittee thereof, is authorized to sit and act at such
times and places within the United States, whether or not the House is sitting,
has recessed, or has adjourned, to hold such hearings, to require the attendance
of such witnesses and the production of such books, papers, and documents, and
to take such testimony, as it deems necessary. Subpenas may be issued under
the signature of the chairman of the committee or any subcommittee, or by any
member designated by any such chairman, and may be served by any person
designated by any such chairman or member.
▼
RULES ADOPTED BY THE 83D CONGRESS
House Resolution 5, January 3, 1953
Rule X
STANDING COMMITTEES
1. There shall be elected by the House, at the commencement of each Con-
gress, the following standing committees :
• * 4> • * * •
(q) Committee on Un-American Activities, to consist of nine members.
• * • • • • •
BXTLE XI
POWERS AND DtrriES OF COMMITTEES
17. Committee on Un-American Activities.
(a) Un-American Activities.
(b) The Committee on Un-American Activities, as a whole or by subcommittee,
is authorized to make from time to time, investigations of (1) the extent, char-
acter, and objects of un-American propaganda activities in the United States,
(2) the diffusion within the United States of subversive and un-American prop-
aganda that is instigated from foreign countries or of a domestic origin and |
attaclis the principle of the form of government as guaranteed by our Constitu- |
tion, and (3) all other questions in relation thereto that would aid Congress i
in any necessary remedial legislation.
The Committee on Un-American Activities shall report to the House (or to the
Clerl£ of the House if the House is not in session) the results of any such investi-
gation, together with such recommendations as it deems advisable.
For the purpose of any such investigation, the Committee on Un-American |
Activities, or any subcommittee thereof, is authorized to sit and act at such times ,
and places within the United States, whether or not the House is sitting, has
recessed, or has adjourned, to hold such hearings, to require the attendance
of such witnesses and the production of such books, papers, and documents, and
to take such testimony, as it deems necessary. Subpenas may be issued under
the signature of the chairman of the committee or any subcommittee, or by any '
member designated by such chairman, and may be served by any person desig- j
nated by any such chairman or member. I
INYESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE
SAN FKANCISCO AREA— Part 1
TUESDAY, DECEMBER 1, 1953
United States House of Representatives,
Subcommittee of the Committee on Un-American Activities,
San Francisco^ Galif.
Public Hearing
The Subcommittee of the Committee on Un-American Activities met,
pursuant to call, at 9 : 30 a. m., in the hearing room of the board of
supervisors, city hall, Hon. Harold H. Velde (chairman of the com-
mittee) presiding.
Committee members present: Representatives Harold H. Velde
(chairman), Donald L. Jackson, Gordon H. Scherer, and Clyde Doyle.
Staff members present: Frank S. Tavenner, Jr., counsel; William
A. Wlieeler, investigator ; and Juliette P. Joray, acting clerk.
Mr. Velde. The committee will be in order.
Let the record show that acting under the authority of the resolu-
tion establishing the House Committee on Un-American Activities,
I have set up a subcommittee for the purpose of conducting hearings
in the city of San Francisco, composed of the following members:
the Honorable Donald L. Jackson from California, the Honorable
Gordon H. Scherer of Ohio, the Honorable Morgan M. Moulder of
Missouri, the Honorable Clyde Doyle of California, and myself,
Harold Velde, as chairman.
I understand that Mr. Moulder is on his way to San Francisco by
plane and will be here for tomorrow's hearings.
The committee is charged by the Congress of the United States with
the responsibility of investigating the extent, character, and objects of
un-American propaganda activities in the United States and diffusion
within the United States of subversive and un-American propaganda
that is instigated from foreign countries, or of a domestic origin, and
attacks the principles of the form of government as guaranteed by
our Constitution and all other questions in relation thereto that will
aid Congress in any necessary reniedial legislation.
It has been fully established by testimony before this and other con-
gressional committees, as well as the courts of our land, that the Com-
munist Party of the United States is part of an international conspir-
acy which is being used as a tool or a weapon by a foreign power to
promote its own foreign policy and which has for its object the over-
throw of the governments of all non-Communist countries, resorting
to the use of force and violence if necessary. This organization can-
not live and expand within the United States except by the promulga-
tion and diffusion of subversive and un-American propaganda de-
signed to win adherents to its cause.
This committee, therefore, has conducted extensive investigations
of industrial and defense areas in many parts of the country for the
3065
3056 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
purpose of ascertaining the true nature, extent, character, and objects
of Communist Party activities.
District No. 13 of the Communist Party is comprised of the State
of California, other States, and the Territory of Hawaii. Extensive
investigations in the Territory of Hawaii and in southern California
have resulted in the ascertainment of important and extensive informa-
tion which should be of great aid to the Congress of the United States
in dealing with this difficult problem and in providing to the Congress
of the United States information necessary to the enactment of reme-
dial legislation. It is the purpose of this investigation to ascertain
the nature, extent, character, and objects of Communist infiltration in
the Bay area where there is a great concentration of defense industry
and where the headquarters of District No. 13 of the Communist Party
are maintained. This investigation, unlike those conducted in the Ter-
ritory of Hawaii and southern California, is not concentrated upon a
single industry or enterprise. For the time being the work of the
committee will be of a more general character.
Many witnesses have appeared before this committee, sitting in vari-
ous places throughout the United States, who have revealed their
experiences as former Communist Party members. Such testimony
has added immeasurably to the sum total of the knowledge, character,
extent, and objects of Communist activities in this country.
Witnesses from Hollywood, labor unions, the legal profession, medi-
cal profession, and other groups have made a great contribution to the
defense of our country by disclosing to this committee facts within
their knowledge.
In the view of this committee, such testimony should not be held
against an individual where it has that character of trustworthiness
which convinces one that the witness has completely and finally termi-
nated Communist Party membership and that such testimony has been
given in all good faith.
The committee is not concerned with the political beliefs or opinions
of any witness who has been called before it. It is concerned only with
the facts showing the extent, character, and objects of the Communist
Party activities. By the same token the Congress is not concerned
with disputes between management and labor nor intralabor contro-
versies. It has the single purpose of disclosing subversive propaganda
activities and machinations of the conspiracy whenever and wherever
there is reason to believe it exists.
In keeping with the longstanding policy of this committee, any
individual or organization mentioned during the course of the hearings
in such a manner as to adversely affect them shall have an opportunity
to appear subsequently before the committee for the purpose of making
a denial or explanation of any adverse inferences.
I would also like at this time, before the beginning of these hearings,
to make this announcement to the public : We are here at the direction
of the Congress of the United States, in the discharge of a duty and
obligation that has been placed upon us. The public is here by permis-
sion of the committee and not by compulsion. Any attempt or effort
on the part of anyone to create a demonstration or make audible com-
ment in this hearing room, either favorably or unfavorably, toward the
committee's undertaking, or to what any witness may have to say, will
not be countenanced by the committee. If such conduct should occur,
the officers on duty will be requested to eject the offenders from the
hearing room.
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3057
Mr. Counsel, are you ready to proceed ?
Mr. Tavenner. Yes, sir.
Mr. Velde. Call your first witness, please.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Louis Rosser, will you come forward, please.
Mr. Velde. In the testimony you are about to give before this sub-
committee do you solemnly swear to tell the truth, the whole truth,
and nothing but the truth, so help you God ?
Mr. Rosser. I will.
TESTIMONY OF LOUIS ROSSER
Mr. Tavenner. Will you state your name, please ?
Mr. RossER. Louis Rosser.
Mr. Tavenner. How do you spell your name ?
Mr. RossER. R-o-s-s-e-r.
Mr. Tavenner. How do you spell your first name ?
Mr. RossER. L-o-u-i-s.
Mr. Tavenner. When and where were you born, Mr. Rosser ?
Mr. RossER. April 14, 1906, Atlanta, Ga.
Mr. Tavenner. Wliere do you now reside ?
Mr. RossER. Los Angeles, Calif.
Mr. Tavenner. How long have you lived in California ?
Mr. RossER. Since 1933.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you tell the committee, please, what your edu-
cational training has been ? I am speaking now of your formal educa-
tional training, not Communist Party training.
Mr. Rosser. I finished high school, and I had a half a year at
Sacramento Junior College and one year at UCLA.
Mr. Tavenner. \Vhen did you complete your year of work at
UCLA?
Mr. RossER. February 1926.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Rosser, are you now a member of the Com-
munist Party ?
Mr.RossER. I am not.
Mr. Tavenner. Have you ever been a member of the Communist
Party?
Mr. RossER. I have.
Mr. Tavenner. Over what period of time were you a member ?
Mr. RossER. I was a member of the Communist Party and the Young
Communist League from 1932 to December 1944.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you tell the committee, please, the circum-
stances under which you became a Communist Party member ?
Mr. Rosser. Well, during the depression in southern California I
was unable to get a job, and there was quite a bit of discrimination
against Negro people, and going around I used to hear the Com-
munists speak on street corners, and I listened to them. Finally, I
found out that one of my friends, a Negro student named Harry
Williams, was a member of the Young Communist League and the
Communist Party, and I discussed it with him, and he took me to
a Communist Party class.
At that time I didn't know it was a class, and in the class they dis-
cussed economics, how to fight against discrimination against Negroes
and how to get a job, and in that class also we discussed how the
leaders of America used religion to lull Negroes to sleep, and in that
3058 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
discussion I finally made up my mind that the place for me was the
Communist Party, so I joined the Communist Party, and I was as-
signed to the Young Communist League.
Mr. Tavenner. That, as I understand, was in 1932 ?
Mr. RossER, Yes.
Mr. Tavenner. Did you later occupy positions of leadership in the
Young Communist League in California and the United States ?
Mr. RossER. Yes. I started as literature agent in the Young Com-
munist League. I was the organizer of a Young Communist League
unit. I was the educational director for Los Angeles County of
the Young Communist League. I was the acting president of Los
Angeles County for the Young Communist League. I was a member
of the county committee of the Young Communist League of Los
Angeles County. I was a member of the State committee of the
Young Communist League of Los Angeles County, and I was a mem-
ber of the national committee of the Young Communist League.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Chairman, I desire to offer in evidence a docu-
ment which is entitled "New Frontiers," published in 1937 by the Cali-
fornia Young Communist League. It carries pictures of "our
leaders," one of whom is Lou Rosser, and there is a brief description
given of Lou Rosser in this document, in which it says he is —
Now county educational director. Made his reputation as president of the
South Side Branch. Ran for State assembly in the 1936 elections.
Mr. Rosser, in running for the 1936 election as State assemblyman,
did you run as a member of the Communist Party ?
Mr. Rosser. I did.
Mr. Tavenner (reading) :
YCL representative to the Los Angeles Youth Survey Commission, national
council member.
I ask that the document be designated as "Rosser Exhibit No. 1."
Mr. Velde. You ask that it be introduced into the record, counsel?
Mr. Tavenner. Yes, sir.
Mr. Velde. Without objection it will be introduced into the record
at this point.
(Photostat of document entitled "New Frontiers" was received as
Rosser exhibit No. 1.)^
Mr. Tavenner. That document states, does it not, in substance
what you have just testified to about your official position in the
Communist Party?
Mr. Rosser. That is right.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Chairman, I also desire to introduce in evi-
dence a part of a publication entitled "Two Decades of Progress,"
published by the Communist Party of the United States. Page 29
relates to the Communist Party organization of the 14th Congres-
sional District of the State of California. It bears a picture of Lou
Rosser, and it gives the names of the members of the section executive
committee.
It is true, is it not, Mr. Rosser, that the organizational setup of the
Communist Party was in accordance with congressional districts and
assembly districts?
Mr, RossER. At that time it was true. This was for election
purposes.
' Retained in the files of the committee.
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3059
Mr. Tavenner. I desire to offer page 29 of the document in evidence
and ask that it be marked Exhibit Rosser No. 2."
Mr. Velde. Without objection it will be admitted.
(Document entitled "Two Decades of Progress," p. 29, was received
in evidence as Rosser exhibit No. 2.)
ap,,-^
ROSSER EXHIBIT NO. 2
Twenty Years of Growth and Progress
(4 the.
COMMUNIST PARTY,U.S.A.
COMMUNIST PARTY, LOS ANGELES COUNTY
PETTIS PERRY, Chairman
PAUL CLINE, Executive Secretary
MAX SILVER, Organizational Secretary
AAATT PELMAN, Educational Director
AL BRYAN, Legislative Director
HELEN GARDNER, Membership Director
I
September, 1 939
124 West Sixrti Street MIchigon 8052
jj|> »n ■i>Jlil^<n iipii!i.Jl^<u ii>iJlJfc^M>i&lfa^'FiT«Ailti^M"'i>uJi;ifcp«n« fryiji^^li »>pujii!tmi ttw^liAf^n*'
(Part 1)
^.
3060 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES EST THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
14th CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT I
2308 Griffith Avenue
SECTION EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE
Lou Hosscr
Lou Rosser, Organizer Dave Himelstein
Leona McGenty, Org.-Sec'y. n°!i^D°"^
Pettis Perry
Margaret Nelson, Membership Dir. Me\e Young
Libby Corngold, Trade Union Dir. Schrier
The Communist Party Branches of the 14th Congressional District bring
to our Party on its 20th Anniversary greetings of 20 years of struggle
for labor's rights and Negro rights; for democracy, peace and socialism.
The 14th CD. is on important working class district of Los Angeles
County. Approximately 70% of the unemployed live in this territory, 90%
of the Negro people live here, the ratio of small business people to large
decidedly favors the small, most of Los Angeles Union men meet here.
90% of the slum dwellings are standing in our Congressional district.
Here the conditions for the broadest and most healthy political unity
are present. There are probably more peoples organizations meeting in the
14 C.D. than in any other district in Southern California. These organiza-
tions range from simple social clubs and businessmens associations to
trade union and our Party Branches.
The Executive Committee and the Branches of our Party In the 14th
Congressional District pledge to continue the rich traditions of struggle for
democracy and freedom in this District and to build and strengthen the
Party so it con fulfill its historic role.
44 A.D. East Branch, Schrier, Organizer
44 A.D. West Branch, Sam Title, Organizer
44 A.D. North Branch, Frances Wintner, Organizer
55 A.D. Branch, Delda Wennrick, Organizer
62 A.D. Branch, Wm. Nelson, Organizer. Headquarters — 2308 Griffith
Avenue
Fredrick Douglass Branch
64 East Assembly Branch, Paul Williams, Organizer, Phone MU. 9486
64 West Assembly Branch Finnish Branch
Mexican Branch Warehouse Branch
4ppanese Branch Clerks Branch
Hungarian' Branch Utilities Branch
29
(Part 2)
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3061
Mr. Tavenner. Will you examine the document, please, and state
whose names appear as the various officers ?
Mr. RossER. Lou Rosser — that is myself — the organizer; Leona
McGenty, the organizational secretary
Mr. Tavenner. Will you spell that name, please?
Mr. RossER. L-e-o-n-a M-c-G-e-n-t-y, the organizational secretary;
Margaret Nelson, the membership director. She was the wife of
Steve Nelson. Libby Corngold —
Mr. Tavenner. Will you spell that name?
Mr. RossER. L-i-b-b-y C-o-r-n-g-o-l-d, the trade-union director.
Dave Himelstein, H-i-m-e-1-s-t-e-i-n, he was a member of the execu-
tive committee ; Carl Brant, C-a-r-1 B-r-a-n-t, he was a member of the
executive committee ; Pettis Perry, he was a member of the executive
committee and the State chairman of the Communist Partj of Cali-
fornia; Adele Young, a member of the executive committee; and
Schrier, a member of the executive committee.
I had at that time under my jurisdiction, beside the Communist
Party branches in the 14th assembly district, the 44th, the 55th, the
62d, and the 64th. I had under my jurisdiction at that time the
Mexican branch, the Japanese branch, the Hungarian branch, the
Finnish branch, warehouse branch, the clerks branch, and the utilities
branch. Those last three were trade-union branches.
Mr. Tavenner. Those were branches of the Communist Party ?
Mr. Rosser. Yes.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you tell the committee briefly the importance
of any of the members of your group as acquired in the later devel-
opment of the Communist Party in the United States? You men-
tioned, for instance, a person by the name of Pettis Perry. Will you
tell the committee what Pettis Perry has done ?
Mr. RossER. Well, Pettis Perry is a top, well-educated Communist
Party functionary. Pettis Perry worked in southern California; he
was a member of the county committee, head of the Negro commission.
He was on the State committee of the Communist Party of California,
the chairman of the Los Angeles County committee and a member
of the State committee. He was on the national committee of the
Communist Party, and he acted at the time as head of the Communist
Party of America.
Leona McGenty was head of the professional section for the un-
employed movement which included doctors, teachers, scientists, un-
employed scientists, unemployed actors, unemployed writers, and so
forth.
Libby Corngold was a trade-union leader, a Communist trade-union
leader of the textile industry.
Adele Young was the top State leader of the women and a Negro
woman.
Carl Brant came from the unemployed actors, and he developed into
a top Communist organizer in the trade-union movement, the Elec-
trical Workers of America.
Mr. Tavenner. That is sufficient. I desire to introduce in evidence
a photostatic copy of a news sheet entitled "The Lantern," and ask
that it be marked "Rosser Exhibit No. 3."
Mr. Velde. Without objection it will be admitted.
(Photostat of document entitled "The League Lantern" was re-
ceived in evidence as Rosser exhibit No. 3.)
3062 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES EST THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
ROSSER EXHIBIT NO. 3
l.fi. Ceuniu
%^
jr.
^ ffV lt£S
The advent of the month of Dec-
ember, hesldes heralding the ar-
rival of winter and the merry year-
end holidav season, reminds us it
Is time for the YCL to take inven-
tory; Inventory of its most crec-
lous stock - its members.
It is the time, as the walrus
said, when the YCL gets back the
members who haven 't been coming
around for some time; it is the
tijne when dues are paid ut> all a-
round and every YCLer gets his new
YCL membership book.
These next few weeks are deslrr-
nated as
during which time we '■
must register every
YCLer who either re.-^-
Istered in 1938 or was
recruited during the
year.
There is a tremen-
dous ajnount of very
hard work that our
league has to do to
better the conditions
of the young people.
Each additional person
in our league means
that much more that we
will be able to accom-
olish.
Every branch member
is urged to coonerate
to the fullest extent
with the registration
committee in his par-
ticular branch as his
part in helping the
YCL start the new year
with a grand flourish-
A 100 % RH5ISTRATI0N
TflLL BE FISE IN '59i.'
TH'e' "Review"
T^/ CoA/ST/rur/oA/
keenlnK with the unceasing,
forward surse of time and pro-
gress it has been found necer, -
ary to make certain important
changes in the constitution of
the p. /v. County YCL. Conaequmt-
^ sa
ly the County Board is submitt-
ing the nroDosed changes to the
meinbers of the various branches
to bo voted unon.
our registration weeks, BeglnnlpfL-Pecetnber 5 and contin
' ■ ' uing until the 19th,
discussion will be
3/C-
Many comrades have
Read
Our salute to Karl
Marx branch, newest in
L.A. County. "."hen
considering p. choice of
n".mes for the branch,
ti-.ey said, "If we take
the name of Karl Ucrx,
it will HAVS TO BE THE
BEST FKAirCTr IN THE
ca'NTY. So, they took
Itj end will:* bear -
watching. LeRoy Parra
is Pres., Alice Sal-
Gad«, Secretary.
been missing the cheer-
ful presence of our
Exec. Sec 'y Lou Rossor,
but not all of us laiow
just v'hat has hanpened
to our Lou.
Well, he has received
one of the most wonder-
ful ODDortunittes that
an be given to any
YCLer - six months at
the WAtio;;ial Party
Traininft School under
the best instructors
the party has -^In
Gotham, that burg^ Just
across the rlvei* from
Koboken.
The one thing Lou
wants from us now is
mail - ho wants to hoar
from all of us. N.Y. is
pretty far fro-n L.A.
and Lou's heart is yet
with the L.\. League.
Drop him a lino thru
the County Office -tell
him what
is doing,
poning in
■borhood
sure tliit :
vour branch
what 's hap-
your nelph-
and we are
,rou all .loin
in wishing ^iu & happy
anJ profitable six
months.
t^ead the "Heviev; '
branches. On Decem-
ber 19, the County
Board will meet to
consider proposed a-
mencraents from the
branches. Dt;cember 19
to January 1 will be
given over to ballot-
ing on the Constitu-
tion as amended. Prom
January 1-14, branch-
es will hold noinlna-
tions for County Of-
ficers and ■nombers at
large.
A large county con-
ference will be held
on January 15 to con-
sider the nominitlonc-
January 16-22 will ba
given over to discuss-
ion of candldnt'js. On
the 2?nd there will
h& a membep«hip ■meet-
ing and billottinc;.
The YCL has as its
main job at present
to do all in its now-
cr to help the uaity
of our genorition so
that it na;,' better
fight for its needs.
Along with this -.ve
have the task of help-
ing the young p^o^le
and their organiza-
tions take the steps
towards progressive
nolitical action and
organi zatloa. We can
(continued on page 2^
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3063
Mr. Tavenner, What is the publication or news sheet The Lantern ?
Mr. RossER. It was put out by one of the Young Communist League
groups.
Mr, Tavenner. I will read only this portion of the document. The
document describes Lou Rosser's going to the big city and states as
follows :
Well, he has received one of the most wonderful opportunities that can be given
to any YCLer — 6 months at the national party training school under the best
instructors the party has.
I will not ask you at this time to explain the importance of the
Young Communist League in the Communist Party plan. I will ask
you questions relating to that later on in your testimony. But I think
the committee should understand at this time what your training has
been in both the Young Communist League and the Communist Party,
preparatory to the work that you were to perform in the Communist
Party.
Mr. RossER. Well, in the Young Communist League my training
was, first I went to discussion groups, and the Young Communist
League takes up the same pamphlets and books that the Communist
Party takes up. In my discussion groups I took up What Is To Be
Done, which was by Lenin, which is a book that deals with the value
of theory, understanding the Communist teachings, and I studied Im-
perialism by Lenin in discussion groups.
I studied State and Revolution, The Negro Question, and then after
these discussion groups I was sent to the county school of the Com-
munist Party of Los Angeles.
Mr. Tavenner. Let me interrupt you a moment. I am asking you
this question about your training not only to show what training you
have received, but to inform the committee of the type of training that
is usually given to those who are selected for leadership in the Com-
munist Party, so I would like for your testimony to embrace not only
your own personal training, but the Communist Party plan for train-
ing its leaders.
Mr. RossER. Well, the plan, as I said, I was selected among 25 or
more Communist and Young Communist League organizers and func-
tionaries to attend a county school set up by the county committee of
the Communist Party to train Communist leaders in the teachings of
Marx, Lenin, Stalin.
At this county school I was taught the principles of communism,
trade-union problems, the Negro question, agitation, and propaganda,
how to write leaflets, how to speak on street corners, how to make
speeches. Communist speeches, and party organization, how the party
functions, and then I went back to work, and after working I was
selected by the State committee and the county committee of the Com-
munist Party to attend the State school of the Communist Party.
At the State school of the Communist Party, where they had trade-
unionists, people from the unemployed movement, housewives, people
who worked in YWCA's, people from front groups. Communist Party
group leaders, we took up the problem of the State revolution, dia-
lectical materialism, Peters' Manual, which is a manual put out by
the national committee of the Communist Party on the program of
the Communist Party on party organizations, on the aim of the Com-
munist Party, on how to organize the Communist Party, or how to
3064 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
build Communist Party groups and cells within the basic industries,
the big unions and the organizations of the people, and we also at this
school, the State school had the leaders of the State committee. The
State executive committee of California were some of the lecturers,
William Schneiderman ; Oleta O'Conner Yates lectured; Matt Craw-
ford lectured on the Negro question.
By the way, Matt Crawford is ranking Negro Communist who in
1932 went to Russia under the pretext of making a motion picture.
At that time the Communists in America rounded up a group of top-
flight young Negro intellectuals and convinced them to go to Russia
to make a motion picture of the conditions of Negroes here in Amer-
ica.
Mr. Tavenner. Just a moment. I desire to offer in evidence anf'
have marked as Exhibit Rosser No. 4 a photostatic copy of an issue
of the New York Herald Tribune of June 14, 1932, describing the
sailing of 22 Negroes to work on Soviet films.
Mr. Velde. Without objection it will be admitted at this point.
(Photostat of pages of New York Herald Tribune of June 14, 1932,
was received in evidence as Rosser Exhibit No. 4.)
ROSSER EXHIBIT NO. 4
[New York Herald Tribune, June 14, 1932, p. 16]
22 Negroes Sail Today to Work on Soviet Film
Some of the Scenes Will be Made in Cotton District of Russian Turkestan
United States History is Subject
Several Have Had No Previous Stage Experience
A group of 22 American Negroes will start out from Brooklyn tonight aboard
the Bremen on their vray to Moscow, where during the next 5 months they
will be employed as actors in a motion-picture drama which will interpret the
historical development of the Negro in the United States from the time of the
Civil War. According to the group's contract, the Negroes will pay their way
to Moscow but while they are on "the lot" they will each receive 400 to 600 rubles a
month ; then they will receive a free passage home.
The Negroes will be employed by the Meschrahpom Film Corp. of Moscow,
which produced The Diary of a Revolutionist, now being shown here at the
Cameo.
COMMITTEE SELECTED
At the suggestion of the company, a committee of Negroes and other Americans
interested in the theater and in writing was formed to select the personnel
of the cast. This committee called itself the cooperative committee for the
production of a Soviet film on the Negro in America. A number of the Negroes
named by this body have never had stage experience, but the Moscow com-
pany has informed them that did not matter. Moscow, it reported, did not
put the same sort of qualifications on its star as Hollywood. The Russians
wanted "representative Negroes."
Henry Lee Moon, a reporter on the Amsterdam News who will be one of the
players, said the group had been selected from a cultural and not a political
standpoint. "So far as I know," Moon said yesterday, "there is only one
Communist in the party."
Moon said "realistic picturization of the Negro at work and play was the
aim of the film. The scenario will avoid the sentimentality and buffoonery
with which the usual Hollywood production on the Negro is burdened. I do not
know what the plot will be, but I have heard that the scenario has been finished.
It has been written by a German, a Russian and by Lovett Whiteman, an Ameri-
can Negro now in Russia." Whiteman, a teacher of mathematics and chemistry
in the new Little Red School for sons of American engineers in Moscow, is a
graduate of Columbia University. He studied the drama here and went to
Russia about 5 years ago.
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES EST THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3065
THOSE MAKING THE TKIP
The following will make the trip :
Alberga, Laurence, Ohio, of 470 West 146th Street, agricultural worker.
Crawford, Matthew, of Berkeley, Calif., insurance clerk.
Garner, Sylvia, of 250 West 136th Street, singer and actress, who appeared
with Ethel Barrymore in Scarlet Sister Mary.
Hill, Leonard, of 1461 W Street NW., Washington, social worker.
Hughes, Langston, poet, playwright, novelist, author of Not Without Laughter.
Jenkins, Katherine, of 435 Convent Avenue, social worker.
Jones, Mildred, of 615 Caldwell Street, Newberry, S. C, art student.
Lewis, Juanita, of 247 West 143d Street, singer and dramatic reader and
member of Hall Johnson Negro Choir.
Lewis, Mollie, of 43 West 66th Street, student at Teachers' College, Columbia.
Lewis, Thurston McNairy, of 1851 Seventh Avenue, actor, member of cast of
"Ham's Daughters."
McKenzie, Allen, of 112 38th Avenue, Corona, Queens, salesman.
Miller, Loren, of 837 East 24th Street, Los Angeles, city editor of The California
Eagle.
Montero, Frank C, of 287 East 55th Street, Brooklyn, student at Howard
University, Washington.
Moon, Henry Lee, reporter, the Amsterdam News.
Patterson, Lloyd, of Westfield, N. J., paperhanger.
Poston, Theodore R., of 2293 7th Avenue, reporter on the Amsterdam News.
Rudd, Wayland, of 205 West 115th Street, actor, member of the casts of the Em-
peror Jones, Othello, Porgy and in Abraham's Bosom.
Sample, George, Binghamton, N. Y., student at Fordham.
Smith, Homer, of Minneapolis, clerical worker.
Thompson, Louise, of 435 Convent Avenue, research assistant in labor problems.
West, Dorothy, of 43 West 66th Street, short-story writer and member of cast
of Porgy.
White, Constance, of Hoburn, Mass., student and social worker.
The group will proceed from Bremen to Stettin, where they will board a Finnish
steamer for Helsingfors. From there they will board another ship bound for
Leningrad, where they are due Jime 24. Work on the film will begin on July 1.
Some of the scenes will be made in the cotton-growing districts in Russian
Turkestan.
MEMBERS OF COMMITTEE
On the committee which selected the group were W. A. Domingo, Miss Thomp-
son, Bessye Bearden, Prof. George S. Counts of Columbia, Malcolm Cowley,
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Dana, William H. Davis, Floyd Dell, Romeo L,
Dougherty, Waldo Frank, Roland Gallin, Cecil Hope, Langston Hughes, Rose
McClendon, Edna Thomas, Alan Max, Loren Miller, Charles Rumford Walker,
John H. Hammond, Jr., Harry Allen Potamkin, Will Vodery, Harold Williams,
Hugo Gellert and Doone Young. The Negroes expect to return to the United
States about January 1.
Mr. Tavenner. What was the ostensible or the represented purpose
of the Communist Party in taking these Communist Party members
to the Soviet Union for the filming of a picture ?
Mr. RossER. Well, the main purpose of the Communist Party at
that time was to use them to show them the workers' paradise over
there, the way minorities were treated, and then to use them as
propaganda material when they arrived back into America, but most
of these people who went over there became disillusioned, and today
some of the outstanding anti-Communists in America are these
Negroes that they took over there.
One of them works for the National Urban League, and he is one
of the outstanding anti-Communists we have.
Mr. Jackson. Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Velde. Mr. Jackson.
Mr. Jackson. I think it would be very well if Mr. Rosser would
give us the names of those who have been active in the anti-Communist
41002—54— pt. 1 2
3066 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
figlit. Too often I think that our hearings reflect only the names of
those who have been active on belialf of the Communist Party, and I
think that the name of the gentleman whom you have mentioned,
together with the others, should be in the record.
Mr. Velde. The chair concurs with the member. If the witness can
remember the names of those who are active in the anti-Communist
fight at the present time, we would appreciate it if you would give
them to us.
Mr. RossER. Well, for reasons, I can only give one name. The one
name that I said was the top active anti-Communist is Lee Moon,
L-e-e M-o-o-n. He is on the national executive committee of the Na-
tional Urban League. That is an organization that works for better
relationships between all races here in America and the opening
up of job opportunities.
Mr. ScHERER. Do you know if any pictures were actually produced
by this group that went to Russia ?
Mr. RossER. No, they didn't make any pictures. My understanding
is it broke up in squabbles, and they had to bring them home, and
today there are only about 3 who are active who went : Matt Crawford,
as I said, on the State committee here in California, and Louise
Thompson, a Negro woman who is the secretary or executive secretary
of the International Workers' Order of America.
Mr. ScHEEER. Wliere were these films to be used, in Russia or here ?
Mr. RossER. All over the world, especially in Africa, Asia, and
the Far East, China.
Mr. ScHERER. Did you know what those films were to depict?
Mr. RossER. The life of the Negroes in America. At that time
the Communist Party slogan was national liberation of the Negroes
in America, and in discussing this slogan and program the Communist
Party said that the Negroes, when they were freed by the Civil War,
were introduced to a new kind of slavery, legal slavery, sharecropping,
and that the Negroes were denied the ownership of the land, although
they farmed the land, and therefore, in order for the Negro in America
to be free, he had to organize and mobilize and fight against the
southern landlords and smash the plantation system, set up the dic-
tatorship of the proletariat, Negro Soviet.
Mr. ScHERER. There wasn't any question in your mind that those
pictures were to exaggerate the discriminations that do exist in this
country ; was there ?
]\Ir. RossER. Well, I would put it in another way : They weren't so
much interested in the question of the Negroes in America at that time,
but they were using America, heralded throughout the world as a
land of democracy and freedom, and they were going to use these
pictures to show the people in the Far East, the darker races, in India,
on how the Negroes in America are treated and how can you trust
America when they treat their own colored brothers this way.
It was to be a propaganda deal used throughout the world.
Mr. Velde. Do you think by any stretch of the imagination that
Soviet Russia was interested actually in liberating the Negroes or
eliminating discrimination for the races in this country?
Mr. RossER. Would you say that again ?
Mr. Velde. Do you think that Soviet Russia's leaders were actually
interested in liberating the Negro, as you mentioned a while ago, in
the United States, or what was their chief interest f
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3067
Mr. RossER. Well, I will say this : In my teachings and understand-
ing the Communist Party slogan of self-determination of the Negro
in the Black Belt at the 1938 world congress of the Communist Inter-
national, where they discussed thoroughly the American scene, they
gave to the American people this slogan — it is a slogan of rebellion,
a slogan to arouse the Negroes and confuse the Negroes and to try
to use them to help, and they say it is a tactic during that period, a
tactic of the Communist Party to create confusion and disunity so as
to w^eaken America and to help bring about the real aim of the Com-
munist Party, and that is the proletarian revolution.
Mr. ScHERER. In other words, the Communist Party wasn't sincerely
interested in the problems in the Negro as such?
Mr. EossER. Oh, no.
Mr. Doyle. Mr. Chairman, may I ask this question ?
Mr. Velde. Mr. Doyle.
Mr. Doyle. Do you know whether or not that policy of the Com-
munist Party has changed as far as the American Negro is concerned,
or do they still use them for purposes of encouraging rebellion?
Mr. RossER. Well, the Communist Party policy on the Negro is tied
up with the whole strategy of the Communist Party. It is just a part
of it, and the policy of the Communist Party changes as conditions
change.
On the Negro question, for example, during the 1930's when they
said national liberation, and they called upon the Negroes to revolt,
and they tried to organize and help them to revolt, during that stage
the Communist Party position was that war was imminent. It would
either be a war against the Soviet Union or a war between the capital-
ist nations, and in mobilizing and organizing the American people
to fight against the war, the Negro population in America, the Negro
Americans, were an important part, but they set them apart in order
to try to create division, disunity, in order to weaken this country.
Their policy changes as the world situation changes. They fight
for Negro rights, and the policy of the Communist Party of America
is tied up with the defense of the Soviet Union. If things are run-
ning all right, the Communist Party makes partial demands for the
Negroes; they take it easy. If things are going rough, and they
think the Soviet Union is in danger, the Communist Party raises this
slogan again of rebellion, trying to organize the Negroes to rebel.
Mr. Doyle. That then is their present policy, the same as it was
before ?
_ Mr. RossER. They today are back to the slogan of national libera-
tion of the Negro people, that they are an oppressed nation in
America, and that they have a right to govern themselves, and that
the only way they can do it is to smash the landlords, smash the plan-
tation system, and set up in the South the Negro Soviet republic.
Mr. DoYLE. Did I understand your answer just then? You said
the Communist Party to your knowledge plans to set up a Soviet re-
public in the South of Negroes ?
Mr. RossER. That is what they told them. Of course they put a
"but" there in the discussion in classes and groups of the top level of
the Conamunist Party, and that is that the Negroes have a right to
secede. _ That is the plan worked out by Stalin for the minorities in
the Soviet Union, and they applied it to the American scene. They
3068 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES EST THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
have a right to secede from the American nation once they had estab-
lished a Soviet America. But this right is based on how the Com-
munists feel — what is the situation in the world toward the Soviet
Union. If seceding would weaken America, then the Communist
Party members, Negro and white in the South, would vote against
secession. If they thought it would strengthen America, then they
would go along and secede.
But I will say this : In the ranks of the Communist Party there have
been big discussions on this question, and the majority of the Negro
Communists have opposed this and have accused the party of attempt-
ing to segregate the Negroes once the revolution is had and they have
also accused them — said that if the Negroes would rebel in the South,
the rest of this country, they would shoot them down like a bunch of
dogs, so you can see it is a tactic of the party.
Mr. Jackson. Mr. Rosser, to what extent do you believe that the
doctrine of secession and rebellion was successful at that time among
the great majority of American Negroes?
Mr. RossER. Well, it was repudiated by the top leadership of the
Negro community. The Negro community, the Negro press, came
out and repudiated the whole deal, and the Negroes themselves during
that time, they did not recruit too many Negroes into the Communist
Party, and the Negroes saw through the whole deal. They saw that
it was a maneuver of the Communist Party to infiltrate down into the
Negro community to recruit and build the Communist Party.
Mr. Jackson. About the use of the word "rebellion," what was your
understanding as a functionary of the Communist Party? Did the
term connote actual armed rebellion in your opinion ? Was that what
was taught?
Mr. RossER. Yes.
Mr. Jackson. Thank you, Mr. Rosser.
Mr. DoYx,E. Apropos of that pertinent question by Mr. Jackson, I
think you said that you taught from a book entitled "State and
Revolution." Did that book, published by the Communist Party,
advocate revolution by force and violence?
Mr. RossER. That is right. That is Lenin's development of the
dictatorship of the proletariat, of the state.
Mr. Doyle. Then part of your function was to teach that book by
Mr. Lenin, that the time would come when it would be appropriate as
part of the Soviet Communist scheme to have the American Negro
use force and violence to help overthrow the constitutional govern-
ment in this country ; is that correct ?
Mr. RossER. Well I wouldn't put it that way.
Mr. Doyle. How would you put it ?
Mr. RossER. I would put it that the basic aim of the Communist
Party in America during that period that I studied that was to
prepare and organize — prepare the American working class and the
American people to fight against the war and that the struggle of
the Communist Party for Negro rights and for liberation of the Negro
people was part of this overall program of the Communist Party at
that time to foment a revolution and to create the situation where,
if America went to war, they would carry out Lenin's teaching and
turn the war into civil war and smash, if they could, the Government
of the United States. This whole program that they presented to
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3069
the Negroes and tried to organize the Negroes to push was a part
of this overall progi-am of preparing the revolution.
Mr. Doyle. So I will understand your answer, part of this progi-am
was the eventual use of force and violence by the American Negro in a
civil war, if that time arrives ?
Mr. RossER. Yes; part of the program was — if the opportunity
through fighting the landlords, for the right to sit on juries, for the
right of the land, created itself — was to smash the plantation owner-
ship. The only way you can smash it — Lenin said you had to use
arms. You can't smash it with your hands. It is a question of force
and violence.
Mr. DoTLE. All right ; thank you.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Rosser, were you acquainted with Manning
Johnson ?
Mr. RossER. Yes, I knew Manning Johnson. He was a member of
the national committee of the Communist Party, a Negro, who quit
the Communist Party, I think, in the early forties.
Mr. Tavenner. Manning Johnson testified on this same subject
and in much the same way that you have when he appeared before
this committee in 1949, and during the course of the testimony there
was introduced in evidence through him as Exhibit No. 15 a map
of the United States which had delineated on it those areas which
were denominated the Black Belt and which was to constitute the
new nation.
Will you examine this map, which appears as the frontispiece
of the committee release, and state whether you observed it and were
familiar with it and whether it was used in the teaching of Com-
munist Party members by the leaders of the Communist Party?
Mr. Rosser. Yes, that's it.
Mr. Tavenner. What is that?
Mr. Rosser. That's it, the Black Belt. The Communist Party
theory was that the Negroes were in majority down through Mary-
land, Mississippi, South Carolina, and the Cotton Belt where the
majority of the cotton was raised, that they were in majority, that
they were a nation based on the teachings of Stalin, that they had
one culture, that their main occupation was farming, and they
had one language, the American language, and so forth, and there-
fore they were a nation, and this Black Belt was where the party
said that once the Negroes were successful, they had a right to set
up the Negro Soviet republic.
Mr. ScHERER. In advocating^ that, the Communist Party function-
aries in this country overlooked one thing, did they not, namely,
that the Negroes were opposed to segregation, and this plan called
for segregation. Wasn't that their big mistake?
Mr. Rosser. That was the mistake, and Browder later on stated
to the national committee of the Communist Party that the Negroes
were for integration, and that they had made a mistake along this
line, but they threw Browder out for that and a lot of other things
of watered-down Marxism.
Mr. Tavenner. You referred to this trip to the Soviet Union for
the purpose of filming a picture, and you mentioned the name of
Matt Crawford. Wliat was Crawford's first name?
Mr. Rosser. Matt Crawford, that is all I have ever known.
3070 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
Mr. Tavenner. Will you look at the article and see whether or not
his first name appeared in it ? That is exhibit No. 4.
Mr. RossER. Matthew Crawford.
Mr. Tavenner. You have mentioned the Negro question in connec-
tion with your schooling, both on the local level, the county level, the
State level, and presently I am going to ask you whether you came
in touch with it on a national level.
Mr. RossER. I did.
Mr. Tavenner. But for the present we were discussing your train-
ing in the State Communist school. Where was that school conducted ?
Mr. RossER. It was conducted here in San Francisco.
Mr. Tavenner. You named several of those who taught. Have you
named all that you can recall who taught?
Mr. Rosser. At the present time I can't.
Mr. Tavenner. Can you recall at this time the names of others who
took the course with you?
Mr. RossER. Not at the present.
Mr. Tavenner. You mentioned in connection with that course
Peters' Manual. Who was this man Peters ?
Mr. RossER. Well, Peters was a top trained Communist, trained in
the Soviet Union.
Mr. Tavenner. Was he known as J. Peters ?
Mr. RossER. Yes, J. Peters.
Mr. Tavenner. Was he also known as Alexander Stevens ?
Mr. RossER. Yes, Alexander Stevens. He worked through the na-
tional committee. He had many jobs, and this Peters' Manual is the
Communist International speaking to the American people, and J.
Peters prepared it for the Communist Party here in America.
Mr. Tavenner. Then it may be said that this was a directive from
the Communist Party in a foreign country to the Communist Party
in the United States through J. Peters ?
Mr. RossER. That is right.
Mr. Tavenner. To what extent was this manual used in your teach-
ing and training?
Mr. RossER. Well, it was used, first of all — it gave us the basic aim
of the Communist Party in America and the world, and the major aim
of the Communist Party of the world is to overthrow capitalism and
set up a world socialist state in America. That is the same thing.
It gave us the basic methods on how the Communist Party should
work, that the basic industries should be the concentration point of
the Communist Party here in America : steel, auto, longshore, marine,
communications, transportation, like railroads — they should be the
concentration point of the Communist Party; and then in Peters'
Manual we were taught how to build cells and fractions within these
gi'oups, and then in there we dealt with the international solidarity
of the Communist Parties throughout the world and the Negro ques-
tion, the small farmers, they called these the allies of the working
class and so forth,
Mr. Velde. Mr. Rosser, did this school have a name?
Mr. RossER. It was the State School of the Communist Party.
Mr. Velde. What was the location, physical location?
Mr. RossER. San Francisco.
Mr. Velde. Do you remember the street address or approximately
where it was?
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES EST THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3071
Mr. RossER. I tliink it was at the Finnish Hall. They have a
Finnish lodge or something here. I think that is what it was.
Mr. Doyle. Mr. Chairman, may I ask this question ?
Mr. Velde. Mr. Doyle.
Mr. DoTLE. I notice, Mr. Rosser, you said that the basic industries
of the United States were the concentration points of the Communist
Party in this manual, Peters' Manual. Why would the Communist
Party center on steel and transportation, on the basic industries of
the United States? What would be their interest in centering on
those ?
Mr. RossER. Because the Communist Party follows the teachings of
Lenin and Marx and Stalin, and the teachings of Lenin and Marx and
Stalin, through experiences that they have had, teach them that the
working class, the workers from basic industries, are the backbone of
building the revolution, that they are the only class that can and will
carry out a successful revolution.
Mr. ScHERER. The primary purpose being to eventually control
those basic industries ?
Mr. RossER. That is right.
Mr. ScHERER. By the Communist conspiracy ?
Mr. RossER. That is right.
Mr. DoTLE. May I interject this question then: Control for what
purpose? ^Hiy would the Soviet Union want to control the basic
American industries ?
Mr. Rosser. Well, I think I said in the beginning that the defense of
the Soviet Union was the key tactic or strategy of the Communist
Parties of the world and the Communist Party of America in building
the revolution because they realize that if the Soviet Union was de-
stroyed, communism would be put back thousands of years or hundreds
of years, and therefore in control of the basic industries, in case of a
war. In case of a war with the Soviet Union it is possible for the
party, through its teachings and understanding and strategy, to shut
down these industries, sabotage.
Mr. Doyle. In other words, is it my understanding — do I under-
stand you to testify that the purpose of the Soviet Union Communist
Party in the United States is to control our basic industries so that if
there should be a war between the United States and the Soviet Union,
the basic industries would be directed to protect the Soviet Union in-
stead of the United States ?
Mr. RossER. Not only a war between the Soviet Union and the
United States, but if like Hitler-went to war against the Soviet Union
or if England or France would go to war against the Soviet Union,
it is a question of weakening this country so through control, through
having Communist groups in control of the unions that operate within
these industries, so that we could not send aid to those countries, and
if it was ourselves at war, it would be the strategy to sabotage them,
and so forth.
Mr. ScHERER. To sabotage those industries?
Mr. RossER. That is right.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Rosser, you have mentioned the role and aim
of the Communist Party in such a manner that I think to read from
Peters' Manual would be a repetition of a lot that you have said, so I
3072 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
shall not do that other than to refer to two short passages which I
think, Mr. Chairman, should be read into the record.
I quote from Peters' Manual as follows :
As the leader and organizer of the proletariat, the Communist Party of the
United States of America leads the working class in the fisht for the revolutionai-y
overthrow of capitalism, for the establishment of the dictatorship of the prole-
tariat, for the establishment of a Socialist Soviet Republic in the United States,
for the complete abolition of classes, for the establishment of socialism, the first
stage of the classless Communist society.
Then I will read just one sentence from a pledge, which, according
to a note in the manual, was given by Browder to 2,000 workers in
New York. The sentence is as follows :
I pledge myself to rally the masses to defend the Soviet Union, the land of
victorious socialism.
Those were things which I think you have pointed out in your testi-
mony and which is corroborated by the very language of Peters'
Manual.
I want to ask you one further question relating to Peters' Manual.
We hear so frequently from witnesses appearing before this committee
who have not given up their support of communism that it is a demo-
cratic form of government ; they speak of the democratic processes, the
so-called democratic processes of communism. Now, I want to read
one short paragraph on that subject in which J. Peters states as
follows :
We cannot imagine a discussion, for example, questioning the correctness of the
leading role of the proletariat in the revolution, or the necessity for the prole-
tarian dictatorship. We do not question the theory of the necessity for the force-
ful overthrow of capitalism. We do not question the correctness of the revolu-
tionary theory of the class struggle laid down by Marx, Engels, Lenin, and Stalin.
We do not question the counterrevolutionary nature of Trotskyism.
In other words, they w^ere not permitted to question in the Com-
munist Party, if you read literally the language of J. Peters ; isn't that
correct ?
Mr. RossER. That is correct.
Mr. Tavenner. Was that true in practice?
Mr. RossER. That is true in practice.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Chairman, I think this is a convenient place for
a recess.
Mr. Scherer. Let me ask one more question on this subject before
we recess.
Mr. Velde. Mr. Scherer.
Mr. Scherer. Isn't it a fact that during the time you were in the
party and taking these various courses that the party functionaries
taught or actually taught the mechanics of sabotage for the basic
industries ?
Mr. RossER. Well, the fact is that at the national training school of
the Communist Party held in New York, where I spent the 6 months,
the basic book used by the national committee of the Communist Party
that organized that school was the History of the Communist Party of
the Soviet Union. In welcoming us to the school, Pop Mindel and
George Siskin, two old-time charter member Communists, both trained
in Russia, stated that in study of the History of the Communist Party
of the Soviet Union that we would understand the importance of
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3073
Marxism-Leninism ; that we would understand that without a revolu-
tionary theory there could be no revolution ; we would understand that
without a party of a new type, a Marxist-Leninist party or Commu-
nist Party, a party of social revolution, a party that was able and capa-
ble of mobilizing the American people and leading the American peo-
ple to the final goal and that of revolution, of smashing the American
Government by force and violence and setting up a dictatorship of
the proletariat — that was the basic thing.
Now, also they pointed out that we would learn how the Bolsheviks
of Kussia did legal work and illegal work, how they worked in the
open, some were Communists, and at the time they had some in the same
union and organization not known as Communists, how they used the
legal organizations of the people to propagandize the people. Also we
were taught how Lenin taught the Bolsheviks how to retreat. There
were certain times that they had to retreat.
One, as an example they gave us, was the Breslau Pact, where the
Germans — Lenin convinced the Bolsheviks that the best thing to do
was to make a peace, although it was a hard peace, but to make this
peace in order to regroup and gather their forces and prepare them,
that if there was a counterrevolution when the war ended, they could
move forward.
They also taught us the importance of strikes, how an economic strike
for the just demands of the workers — that the workers wanted $1.50 an
hour, they wanted safety conditions in the factory; these were just
demands — and how to use these demands to foment a strike, how to
build this strike into a political strike, into a general strike, and then
how a general strike could develop into a city wide uprising, and how
a citywide uprising could develop into an armed uprising, and the
necessity in the question of an armed uprising, the necessity that you
couldn't have an armed uprising unless you had arms, how to get arms.
The History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union is the basic
book used by the Communists ; that gives them the answer. It is not
the Leninism that can only be applied in Russia ; it is applied by the
Communist Parties of the world. It gives them the answer of when to
retreat, when to go forward — for example now. The Communists —
the history of the Communist Party, if you look there — after the 1905
revolution, when the revolution was broken and crushed, Lenin taught
the Communists how to go deep underground, how to use the legal
organizations, the unions, the fraternal organizations, civic organiza-
tions, of the people to carry out propaganda and how to use the Russian
literature.
Mr. Velde. The committee will be in recess at this point for 10
minutes.
(Whereupon, at 10 : 32 a. m., the hearing was recessed, to reconvene
at 10:42 a. m.)
(The hearing reconvened at 10 : 41 a. m.)
Mr. Velde. Proceed, Mr. Counsel.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Rosser, you have explained the course of train-
ing offered by the Communist Party on the lower levels in the counties
and the State. Do you know of any other types of schools that the
Communist Party maintained on a State level ?
Mr. RossER. Well, the Communist Party in each county in Cali-
fornia— and this is true in all the big industrial cities. States — has
3074 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
workers' schools, schools organized where the rank and file Communist
Party members can attend, and where they can bring their friends
from the factories, shops, and organizations they belong to, and they
advertise it, where anybody can come and learn about communism.
In Los Angeles we had a workers' school, and in San Francisco we
had a workers' school, and as the policy of the Communist Party
changed, the policy of these schools changed in a sense.
Mr. Tavenner. Now the schools that you attended up to the present
time, up until the time you have described, have been schools limited to
Communist Party members?
Mr. RossER. They have been training schools organized by the Com-
munist Party in the State and the county and on a national scale to
train those Communists whom they thought were leadership material
to develop them into Communist Party leaders.
The workers' schools are schools that are advertised and open to the
public.
Mr. Tavenner. Was the San Francisco Workers' School one of those
schools that you have just referred to ?
Mr. RossER. Yes, it was.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Chairman, I desire to offer in evidence as Rosser
Exhibit No. 5 an announcement of courses of the San Francisco
Workers' School.
Mr. Velde. Without objection it will be admitted.
(Photostat of San Francisco Workers' School announcement of
courses was received in evidence as Rosser Exhibit No. 5.)
ROSSER EXHIBIT NO. 5
SAN FRANCISCO WORKERS' SCHOOL
Announcement of Courses
"Without a correct revolutionary theory, there can be no correct revolutionary
practice" — Lenin.
Third Year
Spring Term : March 5 to May 31, 1934
Ruthenberg House
121 Haight Street, San Francisco
Telephone : UNderhill 3425
FOKEWOBD
The San Francisco Workers School functions on the basis of the economic,
political, and philosophic teachings of Marx, Engels, and Lenin, and has as its
fundamental principle the inseparability of revolutionary theory from revolu-
tionary practice. The central aim of the Workers School is to equip workers
with the knowledge and understanding of Marxism-Leninism and its effective
application in their militant struggles against the capitalist class toward the
decisive proletarian victory. The revolutionary working-class movement is in
constant need of trained new groups of active workers, and leaders.
The school is not an academic institution. It participates in all the current
struggles of the working class.
It is necessary to state that the Workers School is the only school in San
Francisco which authoritatively bases its education on the theory of Marxism-
Leninism under the official guidance and leadership of the Communist Party
of the U. S. A. and the Communist International.
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3075
Students seeking to obtain a true scientific Marxist-Leninist education sliould
not be confused by the appearance of unautiiorized scliools pretending to the
same purpose. Serious students of social science will also beware of the so-
called "liberal" schools. Marxism, the application of the principles of dia-
lectical materialism, is a science based on a thorough study of the processes
of social and physical life. This science should be distinguished from the
shallow vaporings of pedants who hide their bankruptcy and confusion under
the title of "liberalism."
Forums
A series of forums, lectures, concerts, and exhibits will be given by the San
Francisco Workers School during the spring term, every Sunday evening.
School Libraby
The school asks for the assistance of all its friends in establishing its library.
We have no endowment and the small tuition fee paid by the students is not
suflScient to cover the expenses connected with the school. Therefore, we ask
that any working-class, political, economic, or research literature that you can
contribute to the school library be sent to the school office. No books allowed
out of the building. Library open daily, 1 to 7 p. m., except Sunday.
Registbation
Spring term 1934 opens March 5. It is essential to register early, since the
size of the classes is limited.
School office open daily, 1 to 10 p. m., except Sunday.
Tuition Fees
Each course of 3 months (12 sessions) $1 for employed, 50 cents for unem-
ployed. Courses under 12 sessions, 50 cents employed and 25 cents unemployed.
OOUESES
All classes night classes. Twelve sessions unless otherwise stated.
Principles af Communism
Monday, 9-10 : 30. Room 202. Instructor, E, Roberts.
Tuesday, 7 : 20-8 : 50. Room 202. Instructor, Ed. Boudreau.
An Introduction to the Study of Marxism-Leninism. Elements of the Revo-
lutionary Movement of the Proletariat. The Two World Systems of Society,
the Economic Crisis and Its Causes, the General Crisis of Capitalism, Imperialist
Contradictions, Imperialist Wars, Proletarian Revolution, the Dictatorship of
the Proletariat, and the Role of the Communist Party.
Principles of Communism for Young Workers
Monday, 7 : 20-8 : 50 p. m.. Room . Instructor, Jean Rand.
Marxian Economics — A
Prerequisite : Principles of communism.
Tuesday, 7 : 20-8 : 50. Room 101. " Instructor, James Branch.
Wednesday, 7 : 20-8 : 50. Room 101. Instructor, Sam Goodwin.
The basic principles of the system and method of Marx and Engels and their
application. Commodities, Value, Surplus Value. Absolute and Relative Sur-
plus Value, Money, Capital, Constant and Variable Capital. Theory of Wages,
Process of Capitalist Accumulation, General law of Capitalist Accumulation.
Marxian Economics — B
Prerequisite : Marxian Economics — A.
Friday, 9-10 : 30 p. m. Room 201. Instructor, Charles Gordon.
The Distribution of Surplus Value, Profit and Price of Production, Commercial
Capital and Commercial Profit, Interest, Ground Rent, Development of Capital-
ism in Agriculture, Crises, Bourgeois Theories, Social Democratic Conceptions,
Marxist Theory of Crises, Monopoly and Finance, Capital and Imperialism.
3076 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
Leninism
Prerequisites : Marxian Economics — A. History of the Three Internationals.
Tuesday, 9-10 : 30. Room 201. Instructor, Sam Darcy, George Morris, James
Branch and others.
The Marxism of the epoch of Imperialism and proletarian revolution. De-
velopment of Imperialism and Imperialist War. Decline of Capitalism. Theory
of Proletarian Revolution. The Dictatorship of the Proletariat ; Agrarian, Na-
tional, and Colonial Questions. Problems of Socialist Construction. Role of
the Communist Party as the Vanguard of the Proletariat.
History of the American Labor Movement
Friday, 7 : 20-8 : 50. Room 202. Instructor, Violet Orr.
The Historical Development of the American Labor Movement, its Tradi-
tions and Changing Tactics and Strategy. Colonial Period and the Revolu-
tionary War, Development of Trade Unions, particularly after the Civil War.
The Imperialist War, its effects upon the American Labor Movement. Organ-
ization and Program of the Trade Union Unity League, and recent developments.
History of the Three Internationals
Prerequisite : Principles of Communism.
Wednesday, 9-10 : 30 p. m. Room 201. Instructor, Emmett Kirby.
Preimperialist epoch of capitalism ; Chartist movement. Revolution of 1848.
American Civil War. Paris Commune and First International. War of 1914-
1918 and collapse of Second International. Russian Revolution : founding, tac-
tics, and role of Communist International. History and taslis of American Com-
munist Party.
History of the Russian revolution
Friday, 9-10 : 30 p. m. Room 202. Instructor, L. Thompson.
Origin of Menshevism and Bolshevism. Role of Bolshevism and Second
International. Revolution of 1905, period of reaction following. The March
1917 revolution. Events leading up to the seizure of power by the Bolsheviks.
Survey of the major stages after 1917. Study of the proletarian dictatorship
in action. Leninism versus Trotskyism and other opportunist doctrines. Les-
sons of the Russian Revolution for the world proletariat.
National and Colonial Problems
Prerequisites : Principles of Communism.
Wednesday, 9-10 : 30. Room 101. Instructor, Carl Hama.
Development of capitalism in the colonies: relationship of imperialism to
colonial peoples and national minorities. Agrarian colonial movements, forms of
the national liberation movement and its relation to the struggle of the prole-
tariat in imperialist countries. History and forms of the Negro liberation
movement in the United States.
Trade Union Strategy and Tactics
Tuseday, 7 : 20-8 : 50. Room 201. Instructor, Neil Hickey.
Strategy of revolutionary and reformist unions. Historical analysis of
American trade-union movement. Study of strike strategy. Immediate tasks
of the Trade Union Unity League and forms of struggle against unemployment.
Rationalization and imperialist war.
Principles of working class organization
Prerequisite : Principles of communism.
(Limited to Communist Party and YCL members.)
Friday, 7 : 20-8 : 50. Room 201. Instructor, Louise Todd.
Training functionaries to apply the organizational principles of working
class organization, role of the party and its relation to the working class,
tasks of the party nuclei, meaning and methods of mass work, and factory con-
centration on the basis of specific party campaigns.
History of the Youth Movement and Program of the Young OommMnist
International
Monday, 7 : 20-8 : 50 p. m. Room 201. Instructor, .Tack Olson.
Origin and development of the revolutionary youth movement from the
International Youth Conference in Berne, 1915. The Second International
Youth Movement. Role of Liebknecht to the First Congress of the Communist
Youth International to the consolidation of the Communist youth movement
since 1919. History, development and tasks of the YCL in the United States.
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3077
Economics for Young Communist League
Prerequisite: Principles of communism.
Monday, 9-10 : 30. Room 201.
Includes the same material as main Marxian economics course with special
emphasis on problems of the revolutionary youth movement in the struggle
against militarism and imperialist war.
Elementary English
Wednesday, 7 : 20-8 : 50. Room 202. Instructor, Cora Reed.
Spelling, writing, reading, and pronunciation for foreign-born workers.
Adva7iced English
Monday, 9-10 : 30. Room 101. Instructor, K. McKee.
Sentence structure, grammar, composition.
w
Elementary Russian
Tuesday, 9-10 : 30. Room 202. Instructor, G. Williams.
Grammar, conversation, writing, and simple reading.
Advanced Russian
Wednesday, 9-10 : 30. Room 202. Instructor, Vladimir A. Tichinin.
Sentence structure, composition, advanced reading, and conversation.
Evolution of Arts and Technics
Wednesday, 9-10 : 30. Instructor, K. Rexroth.
Self-Defense in Courts
Friday, 9-10 : 30. Room 101. Instructors, Elaine Black and George Anderson.
(Four sessions.)
Capitalist court procedure, methods of self-defense and mass support in work-
ing-class trials.
Public Speaking
Monday, 7 : 20-8 : 50 p. m. Room 101. Instructor, T. Alex.
Organization of speeches, delivery, voice control, and effective agitation and
propaganda.
Agitation and Propaganda Technique
Tuesday, 9-10 : 30 p. m. Room 101. Instructors, A. Garrison and R. Casimir.
Theory and practice of effective execution of revolutionary agitation and
propaganda. Slogans, leaflets, bulletins, organization of street and mass meet-
ings, forums, demonstrations, etc.
Revolutionary Journalism
Wednesday, 7 : 20-8 : 50. Room 201. Instructor, Emmett Kirby.
Workers' correspondence, reporting, shop papers, and contradictions of the
capitalist press. Feature writing, the fundamentals of newspaper makeup.
Revolutionary Theater
Friday, 7 : 20-8 : 50. Room 108. Instructor, Harold Davis.
Function of the theater in society. Analysis of the development of the theater
just before the World War; period of radicalization within the bourgeois
theater, and the rise of the revolutionary theater, which is its historical
successor.
Historical Materialism Seminar
Prerequisites : Marxian economics and Leninism.
Friday, 4-6 p. m.
Poster Work
Wednesday, 2-4 p. m. Room 203. Instructor, Lester Balog.
(Six sessions.)
Draioin^
Thursday, 7 : 20-9 : 30. Room 202. Instructor, Jack Roberts.
Design, poster layout, etc.
Still Photography — Elementary
Monday, 7 : 20-8 : 50. Room 203. Instructors, P. Aller and J. Fidiam.
Study and use of various types of cameras, lighting, lenses, choice and
composition of revolutionary working-class subjects.
3078 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
Still Photography — Advanced
Tuesday, 7 : 20-8 : 50. Room 203. Instructors, P. AUer and J. Fidiam.
Darkroom and field practice.
Cinematography
Monday, 9-10 : 30. Room 203. Instructors, Lester Balog and P. Otto.
Criticism of bourgeois pictures, analysis of Soviet news reels, documentary
and acted films. Montage, film production and projection of working class
news reels and films.
Hygiene and Diet
Monday, 7 : 20-8 : 50 p. m. Room 202. Instructor, Dr. H. F. Unslnger.
EXTENSION DIVISION
Oreek Workers Club: 1111 Market Street, History of American Labor Movement
Wednesday, 8-10 p. m. Instructor, Ida Rothstein.
Needle Workers Industrial Union, 830 Market Street, Trade Union Strategy and
Tactics.
Tuesday, 8-9 : 30 p. m.
North Beach Workers School:
Principles of Communism.
History of American Labor Movement.
Principles of working class organization.
Marine Workers, 437 Market Street:
(Conducted in conjunction with Marine Workers Industrial Union.)
Trade Union problems.
Sunday, 2-4 p. m. Instructor, Fred Moore.
EXECtmVE COMMITTEE
James Branch, director Leo Thompson
Esther Goodman, secretary A. Palola
J. W. Weeks, publicity manager C. Dunning
Nell Higman, librarian Dr. Harold F. Unsinger
M. McNab W. Randolph
G. Bergman G. Geoffrin
L. Sugi
ADVISORY COUNCIL
Langston Hughes, writer
Ella Winter, writer
Lincoln Steffens, writer
George Morris, editor. Western Worker
Beatrice Kinkead, teacher
Anita Whitney
Dr. M. H. Crawford
Sam Darcy, district organizer. Communist Party
Benjamin EUisberg, business agent, ornamental plasterers' union, AFL
Ed Harris, Machinist Local No. 68, AFL
Sam Diner, president Needle Trades Workers' Industrial Union
Harry Jackson, coast organizer, Marine Workers' Industrial Union
Leo Gallagher, attorney
Neil Hickey, district organizer. Trade Union Unity League.
Mr. Tavenner. I desire to read some of the material from this
exhibit and the names of the courses and the teachers as a basis for
further questioning.
The foreword to this announcement is as follows :
The San Francisco Workers School functions on the basis of the economic,
political and philosophic teachings of Marx, Engles and Lenin, and has as its
fundamental principle the inseparability of revolutionary theory from revolu-
tionary practice. The central aim of the Workers' School is to equip workers
with the knowledge and understanding of Marxism-Leninism and its effective
application in their militant struggles against the capitalist class toward the
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3079
decisive proletarian victory. The revolutionary working class movement is In
constant need of trained new groups of active workers and leaders.
The school is not an academic institution. It participates in all the current
struggles of the working class.
The first course is entitled "Principles of Communism," and the
instructors are named as E. Roberts and Edward Boudreau, B-o-u-d-
r-e-a-u. Were you acquainted with those two persons?
Mr. RossER. I was not.
Mr. Tavenner. The second course is Principles of Communism for
Young Workers and the instructor is Jean Rand.
Mr. RossER. I was acquainted with her.
Mr. Tavenner. Was Jean Rand a member of the Communist Party
to your knowledge ?
Mr. RossER. Not to my knowledge. She was a member of the Young
Communist League.
Mr. Tavenner. Marxism Economics — A ; instructor, James Branch
and also Sam Goodwin. Were you acquainted with either or both of
those persons ?
Mr. RossER. Both of them.
Mr. Tavenner. Were either of them to your knowledge members
of the Young Communist League or the Communist Party ?
Mr. RossER. Sam Goodwin; Sam Goodwin was a member of the
Communist Party.
Mr. Tavenner. You do not know as to James Branch ?
Mr. Rosser. No.
Mr. Ta\tlnner. Marxian Economics — B is the the next course, and
the instructor is Charles Gordon. Were you acquainted with Charles
Gordon ?
Mr. Rosser. I was not.
Mr. Tavenner. The next course is Leninism; instructors, Sam
Darcy, George Morris, James Branch, and others. Were you ac-
quainted with Sam Darcy?
Mr. Rosser. I was.
Mr. Tam^nner. Was he known to you to be a member of the Com-
munist Party?
Mr. Rosser. He was the organizer of district 13 during that time.
Mr. Tavenner. Were you acquainted with George Morris ?
Mr. Rosser. Yes, I was.
Mr. Tavenner. Was he known to you to be a member of the Com-
munist Party?
Mr. Rosser. He was.
Mr. Tavenner. The next course is History of the American Labor
Movement, and the teacher, Violet Orr, 0-r-r. Were you acquainted
with Violet Orr?
Mr. Rosser. I was.
Mr. Tavenner. Was she Imown to you to be a member of either the
Young Communist League or the Communist Party ?
Mr. Rosser. Communist Party.
Mr. Tavenner. The next course is History of the Three Inter-
nationals ; instructor, Emmett Kirby, K-i-r-b-y. Were you acquainted
with Emmett Kirby ?
Mr. RossER. I was not.
^ Mr. Tavenner. The next course is History of the Russian Revolu-
tion ; instructor, L. Thompson.
3080 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES EST THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
Mr. RossER. I did not know him.
Mr. Jackson. Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Velde. Mr. Jackson.
Mr. Jackson. Mr. Counsel, are the names you are reading those who
were open members of the Communist Party ?
Mr. EossER. Some of them were.
Mr. Jackson. The names that are being read ?
Mr. RossER. Yes ; some of them were, most of them.
Mr. Jackson. I think, Mr. Chairman, in such cases where they were
not open members of the Communist Party the witness should further
identify them and give the source of his Knowledge as to their mem-
bership in the Communist Party.
Mr. Velde. I agree ; if you will do that, Mr. Counsel.
Mr. Tavenner. Yes.
Mr. Velde. Those who are not known to him to be members openly
of the Communist Party.
Mr. Tavenner. National and Colonial Problems is the next course,
with instructor Carl Hama, H-a-m-a. Were you acquainted with Carl
Hama ?
Mr. RossER. I did not know him.
Mr. Tavenner. The next course is Trade Union Strategy and Tac-
tics; instructor, Neil, N-e-i-1, Hickey, H-i-c-k-e-y. Were you ac-
quainted with Neil Hickey ?
Mr. RossER. I did not know him.
Mr. Tavenner. Principles of Working Class Organization is the
next; instructor, Louise Todd. Were you acquainted with Louise
Todd?
Mr. RossER, I was. Louise Todd was a State leader of the Com-
munist Party in California.
Mr. Tavenner. An open member of the Communist Party ?
Mr. RossER. Open member of the Communist Party.
Mr. Tavenner. The next course is History of the Youth Movement
and Program of the Young Communist International; instructor,
Jack Olsen. Were you acquainted with Jack Olsen ?
Mr. Rosser. I was. I was on the county committee of the Los
Angeles Young Communist League with Jack Olsen. He was the
head of Los Angeles County. I was on the State conmiittee of the
Young Communist League. He was on the State committee, and he
later became the head of the Young Communist League in California,
and then he was an open Communist, and then he later became an
official in the Local 6 of the Warehousemen's Union.
Mr. Tavenner. The next course is Economics for Young Com-
munist League ; instructor is not given.
"Elementary English" ; instructor, Cora Reed.
Mr. RossER. I did not know her.
Mr. Tavenner. Advanced English; instructor, K. McKee,
M-c-K-e-e.
Mr. RossER. I did not know him.
Mr. Tavenner. Elementary Russian ; instructor, G. Williams.
Mr. RossER. I did not know him.
Mr. Tavenner. Advanced Russian ; instructor, Vladimir A. Tichi-
nin, V-1-a-d-i-m-i-r T-i-c-h-i-n-i-n. Were you acquainted with him?
Mr. Rosser, No, I was not.
COIVIMUNIST ACTIVITIES EST THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3081
Mr. Tav^nner. Evolution of Arts and Technics; instructor, K.
Rexroth, R-e-x-r-o-t-h. Were you acquainted
Mr. RossER. I did not know her.
Mr. Tavenner. Self-Defense in Courts; instructors, Elaine Black
and George Anderson.
Mr. Rosser. I knew Elaine Black to be a member of the Communist
Party. I knew George Anderson, but I didn't know him to be a
member of the Communist Party.
Mr. Ta\'enner. You did not know him to be a member ?
Mr. RossER. No.
Mr. Tavenner. "Public Speaking"; instructor, T. Alex, A-l-e-x.
Mr. RossER. I did not know him.
Mr. Tavenner. "Agitation and Propaganda Technique"; instruc-
tors, A. Garrison and R. Casimir, G-a-r-r-i-s-o-n and R. C-a-s-i-m-i-r.
Mr. RossER. I knew Garrison, but I didn't know — as an open Com-
munist— but I didn't know the other.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you speak a little louder?
Mr. RossER. I didn't know Casimir.
Mr. Tavenner. What did you say with regard to Garrison?
Mr. Rosser. I knew Garrison as an open Communist.
Mr. Ta\^nner. As an open Commuinst?
Mr. Rosser. Yes.
Mr. Tavenner. "Revolutionary Journalism"; instructor, Emmett
Kirby. I believe I have asked j^ou about Earby.
Mr. Rosser. I didn't know Kirby.
Mr. Tavenner. "Revolutionary Theater" ; instructor, Harold Davis.
Mr. Rosser. I didn't know Harold Davis.
Mr. Tavenner. You did not know him ?
Mr. Rosser. No.
Mr. Tavenner. "Historical Materialism Seminar"; no instructor
named.
"Poster Work"; instructor, Lester Balog, B-a-1-o-g.
Mr. Rosser. I did not know him.
Mr. Tavenner. "Drawing"; instructor. Jack Roberts.
Mr. Rosser. I did not know Jack Roberts.
Mr. Tavenner. "Still Photography — Elementary"; instructors, P.
Aller, A-1-l-e-r, and J. Fidiam, F-i-d-i-a-m. "Study and use of vari-
ous types of cameras, lighting, lenses, choice and composition of revo-
lutionary working class subjects."
Mr. Rosser. I didn't know either one.
Mr. Tavenner. Let me interrupt to ask you what was the signifi-
cance of the teaching of the selection and composition of revolution-
ary working class subjects?
Mr. Rosser. Well, the importance of it is being able to photograph
locations of defense plants — that is a working class subject — being
able to take photographic copies of records and things like that.
Mr. Tavenner. Let me ask at this point, in your experience in the
Communist Party were you ever given an assignment as a courier or
to participate in particular acts of espionage such as obtaining docu-
ments for reproduction and passing them on to enemies of this
country?
Mr. Rosser. I was not.
Mr. Tavenner. "Hygiene and Diet"; Dr. H. F. Unsinger.
41002— 54— pt. 1 3
3082 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
Mr. KossER. I did not know him.
Mr. Tavenner. Apparently there was an extension division of this
school in which extension services were rendered to the Greek Workers'
Club, 1171 Market Street, in which the subject "History of American
Labor Movement" was taught, and the instructor was identified as Ida
Rothstein, R-o-t-h-s-t-e-i-n.
Mr. RossER. I knew her. She was a charter member of the party.
I worked with her down in Los Angeles. She is an open Communist.
Mr. Tavenner. Do you have any personal knowledge of the Greek
Workers' Club?
Mr. RossER. I do not.
Mr. Tavenner. And the next is the Needle Workers' Industrial
Union, 830 Market Street, and the subject was "Trade Union Strat-
egy and Tactics" ; no instructor named. Did you have any personal
knowledge of that organization?
Mr. RossER. Not here in San Francisco.
Mr. Tavenner, North Beach Workers' School, in which there was
taught "Principles of Communism," "History of American Labor
Movement," and "Principles of Working Class Organization." Were
you acquainted with the North Beach Workers' School?
Mr. RossER. No, I was not.
Mr. Tavenner. Marine Workers, 437 Market Street. Do you know
what that address was ? 437 Market Street ?
Mr. RossER. No, I do not.
Mr. Tavenner. There is a notation that this extension course was
"Conducted in conjunction with Marine Workers' Industrial Union";
instructor, Fred Moore. Were you acquainted with Fred Moore ?
Mr. Rosser. I wasn't.
Mr. Tavenner. The executive committee members of this school
are named as follows: James Branch — you have already testified
regarding James Branch, and I believe you said you did not know
him.
Mr. RossER. I did not know him as a Communist.
Mr. Tavenner. Esther Goodman, secretary.
Mr. Rosser. Yes, I knew her as a Communist.
Mr. Tavenner. James Branch was director.
Was Esther Goodman an open Communist member or not ?
Mr. RossER. Well, I didn't know whether she was an open Com-
munist.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you give us further description and account
of the circumstances under which you knew her to be a member of the
Communist Party?
Mr. Rosser. Well, I met her at a meeting of the Communist Party
up here in San Francisco.
Mr. Tavenner. J. W. Weeks, publicity manager.
Mr. Rosser. I didn't know him.
Mr. Tavenner. Nell Higman, N-e-1-1 H-i-g-m-a-n, librarian.
Mr. Rosser. I know a Nell Higman, an open Communist, who is a
retired school teacher. Whether that is she or not I don't know.
-. Mt. Tavenner. Is the person to whom you refer a resident of San
Francisco or some other place?
Mr. Rosser. She is a resident of Los Angeles, but I don't know how
long she has been down there.
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3083
Mr. Tavenner. A. Palola, P-a-1-o-l-a.
Mr. RossER. I don't know him.
Mr. Tavenner. C. Dunning.
Mr. RossER. I don't know him.
Mr. Tavenner. D-u-n-n-i-n-g. Dr. Harold F. Unsigner.
Mr. RossER. I don't know him.
Mr. Tavenner. W. Randolph.
Mr. RossER. I don't know him.
Mr. Tavenner. G. Geoffrin, G-e-o-f-f-r-i-n.
Mr. RossER. I don't know him.
Mr. Tavenner. The advisory council is mentioned here, consisting
of the following: Langston Hughes, writer.
Mr. RossER. I know him, but not as a member of the Communist
Party.
Mr. Ta^^nner. Ella Winter, writer.
Mr. Rosser. I know her, but not as a member of the Communist
Party.
Mr. Tavenner. Lincoln Steffens, writer.
Mr. RossER. I knew him, too. He was Ella Winter's husband.
Mr. Tavenner. George Morris, editor of the Western Worker.
Mr. Rosser. I know him ; he is an open Communist.
Mr. Tavenner. Beatrice Kinkead, K-i-n-k-e-a-d.
Mr. RossER. I didn't know her.
Mr. Tavenner. Did not know her?
Mr. RossER. No.
Mr. Tavenner. Anita Whitney.
Mr. RossER. I know her; she is the chairman of the Communist
Party for the State of California.
Mr. Tavenner. Did you say "is" ?
Mr. Rosser. Yes.
Mr. Tavenner. At the present time ? Do you mean at the present
time ?
Mr. RossER. At the time I knew her, up to the time I got out of the
Communist Party.
Mr. Tavenner, That was in 1944 ?
Mr. RossER. That is right.
Mr. Tavenner. Dr. M. H. Crawford.
Mr. RossER. I identified him.
Mr. Tavenner. Sam Darcy.
Mr. RossER. I knew Sam Darcy.
Mr. Tavenner. Benjamin Ellisberg, business agent, Ornamental
Plasterers' Union, A, F. of L.
Mr. RossER. I didn't know him.
Mr. Tavenner. Ed Harris, Machinist Local No. 68, A. F. of L.
Mr. Rosser. I didn't know him.
Mr. Tavenner. Sam Diner, D-i-n-e-r, president, Needle Trades
Workers' Industrial Union.
Mr. Rosser. I knew him, but I didn't know him as a Communist.
Mr. Tavenner. Harry Jackson, coast organizer. Marine Workers'
Industrial Union.
Mr. Rosser. I knew Harry Jackson well. He was the organizer of
the Marine Workers' Industrial Union, and he was sent out here by the
national committee of the Communist Party, and he was responsible by
3084 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
the national committee for the development of the trade union work
on the coast so far as infiltration of the Communists.
Mr. Tavenner. Leo Gallagher, attorney.
Mr. RossER. I know Leo Gallagher, but I don't know Leo Gallagher
as a Communist.
Mr. Tavenner. Neil Hickey, district organizer of Trade Union
Unity League.
Mr. RossER. I don't know him.
Mr. Tavenner. Now, after the completion of your work in the
county, your training in the county or State schools which you have
described, were you selected for further training?
Mr. RossER. When we closed I was explaining that I had been sent
to the national training school of the Communist Party.
Mr. Tavenner. How were you selected?
Mr. RossER. I was selected by the county committee of Los Angeles
County, the State committee of the Young Communist League, and
the State committee of the Communist Party. Of course the State
committee of the Communist Party of California had the final say.
Mr. Tavenner. Where was the school conducted ?
Mr. Rosser. The school was conducted in upper New York State on
a big estate.
Mr. Ta\t3nner. Do you know whose estate?
Mr. Rosser. I don't know whose estate, and I don't remember
exactly where it was.
Mr. Tavenner. How many persons were in attendance at this
school ?
Mr. Rosser. About 50 or 60.
Mr. Tavenner. Were they from any restricted localities, or were
they from the country as a whole ?
Mr. Rosser. We had two Communist leaders from Puerto Rico.
Then we had Communist leaders from all over America. They had
people who were leaders in the YWCA work ; people who were leaders
m the union, like Morgan Hull from California who went with me,
who was a leader in the American Newspaper Guild. We had trade
union leaders from steel, from auto ; we had leaders from the language
groups such as the Yugoslavs and Armenians, the Polish, the Czechs.
There were two Negroes, myself and a Negro woman leader from
Harlem, and then there were top Communist leaders from the party
organization itself, right out of the party organizations from the
States — every State almost — Florida, New Jersey, Carolina, Cali-
fornia, New York, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut.
Mr. Tavenner. Did I understand you to say there were representa-
tives there from the YWCA?
Mr. Rosser. Yes.
Mr. Tavenner. What do you mean the YWCA ?
Mr. Rosser. That they were Communist leaders in the YWCA
work, and they were on the top national level in the YWCA apparatus.
Mr. Tavenner. What do you mean by "YWCA apparatus" ? What
does that stand for?
Mr. Rosser. Legally they were a member of the national leadership
of the Young Women's Christian Association, but illegally — also they
were leading Communists, which I am sure the national leadership
of the YWCA did not know, and they were brought to this school and
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3085
trained in the theory of Marxism and Leninism, just like the trade
unionists who were there. They were not known Communists in their
unions. Most of them were leaders of their unions, and they were
brought to this school to be trained; and then they had people like
myself who were open Communists in the neighborhoods they had
come from, and they were there.
Mr. Tavenner. Well, did you learn the names of your associates in
the school ?
Mr. EossER. For security reasons when we arrived at the school
every student had an interview with the leaders of the school and we
were told that we were not to ask any questions ; we would only know
each other by the first name; we were not to discuss with them the
work they did back where they came from ; we were not to go down
into the village. We could not leave the premises unless we got per-
mission, so therefore the only people that you really knew at the school
were those people that were in your group, and we became very close
and talked about the work that you did in your home.
In my group I had a person from New Jersey named Martha Stone ;
I had a person named George from the Chicago area.
Mr. Tavenner. Was George the first name or the last name?
Mr. RossER. George is all I know, but I knew he was a top trade
unionist, and I knew that he was in the CIO, and I knew that, but
I never knew his last name ; and I had this lady from the YWCA in
my group, and I had one of the Communist leaders from Puerto Rico
in my group.
Mr. Tavenner. Wliat was the name of the person from the YWCA
who was in your group ?
Mr. RossER. Mary, that is all I know.
Mr. Velde. Mr. Rosser, you mentioned a while ago that this was
done for security reasons. I take it it was for the security of the
Communist Party or the trade-union school, is that correct?
Mr. RossER. It was security for the protection of the Communists
who came to that school. It was divided about 50 percent; 50 per-
cent were known Communists from the States they came from, but
the other 50 percent were Communists who were leaders of other or-
ganizations who were not known as Communists, not even to the rank
and file Communists in the district they came from, so for security
reasons, to protect these people so that they would not be exposed,
nobody was to ask these questions of the Communist Party — I don't
mean the
Mr. Velde. Did you have the feeling yourself, or do you think that
the other people who attended this school had the feeling that they
were doing something wrong in preaching communism or teaching
these various courses which have been mentioned by counsel?
Mr. Rosser. No.
Mr. Velde. Wliat reason would they have for going to this extreme
of protecting them from the exposure then ?
Mr. Rosser. At that time the Dies committee was very active, and
the question of protecting the party — that is one of the basic things
they teach you in the party is that the party has to be protected at all
costs, and there are a lot of measures that the party takes to protect
the party.
3086 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
For example, all leading Communists, they can't do anything be-
cause there is another Communist that trained them. If they see
them get out of line or they break the party policy, and they don't
agree and tell somebody, that is told to the party leadership.
Mr. Jackson. From what section of the country was the woman
who was in your group from the YWCA ?
Mr. RossER. I don't know what section of the country. All I know,
she was in the national setup.
Mr. Tavenner. What do you mean, the national setup ?
Mr. RossER. She was in the national leadership of the YWCA the
legal YWCA.
Mr. Doyle. Mr. Chairman, may I ask this question ?
Mr. Velde. Mr. Doyle.
Mr. Doyle. I think you made the observation a minute ago that you
■were sure that the top authorities — I think that is the term you used —
did not know that these people were there at the school.
Mr. Rosser. That is true.
Mr, Doyle. I think you referred specifically to the YWCA top
leadership not knowing that this woman was there.
Mr. RossER. That is true.
Mr. Doyle. And so stated, didn't you ?
Mr. Rosser. That is right.
Mr. Doyle. How did you know that ?
Mr. Rosser. Because in my discussion — in our discussion in our
group, Morgan Hull got a leave of absence, sick leave, from the Ameri-
can Newspaper Guild. That is what he told me and she discussed
that she got a leave of absence from her work.
Mr. Doyle. My question was directed to this : You made the observa-
tion that you were sure that the top leadership in the YWCA did not
know that she was attending the school.
Mr. Rosser. Well, I will tell you this: Until it was announced in
the Communist leaflet by one of the YCL clubs, the Communist Party
in Los Angeles, rank and file membership, did not know I was at-
tending the school. Nobody was told. I was told not to tell anybody
where I was going, and I didn't write to anybody.
Mr. Doyle. Do I understand that this woman that you mentioned
who was in your group — that you gave the first name of — indicated
to you that she was there secretly and without knowledge of her top
leadership ?
Mr. Rosser. She was there to the Communist school without the
knowledge of the people she worked with in the YWCA.
Mr. Scherer. This 50 percent that you spoke of, 50 percent of the
students that were there, they were actually members of the Com-
munist underground party, were they not ?
Mr. Rosser. That is right.
Mr. Jackson. Did you ever subsequently determine, Mr. Rosser,
whether or not this woman or any of those who were not known by
their organizations to be members of the Communist Party were ever
exposed before any Federal inquiry or in a court action ?
Mr. RossER. No.
Mr. Jackson. Then it is within the realm of possibility that the
people with whom you attended that school may in some instances
still be hidden members of the Communist Party ?
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3087
Mr. RossER. Of course.
Mr. Jackson. Thank you.
Mr. Tavenner. I think you have stated in the earlier part of your
testimony that the principal text used in this school was History of
the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
Mr. RossER. That is right.
; Mr. Tavenner. Will you tell the committee, please, the purpose of
using the History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union as a
text in this highly secret school composed of persons selected as leaders
of the Communist Party throughout the United States?
Mr. Rosser. Well, that was used as a basis to train and teach the
American Communists the methods used by Lenin and Stalin in their
day-to-day work to build and prepare for the revolutionary overthrow
of the Czar in Russia and setting up a socialist state.
Mr. Tavenner. Who were the teachers that used this history as the
basis for their lectures or teaching?
Mr. RossER. Well, the teachers were — the two people who taught us
every day was "Pop" Mindel and George Siskin, S-i-s-k-i-n, George
Siskin. But weekly we had a lecture from the members of the national
political bureau of the Communist Party. Earl Browder lectured on
the united front. Bob Minor, member of the national committee,
lectured on the war and Fascism.
Mr. Tavenner. That is Robert Minor, M-i-n-o-r?
Mr. RossER. That is his name, Robert Minor. James W. Ford, one
of the top-ranking Negro Communists in the Communist movement,
lectured on the Negro question. Roy Hudson at that time was the
head of the trade-union work for the Communist Party, and he lec-
tured on the importance of working in the trade unions.
Mr. Tavenner. That was in New York ?
Mr. RossER. Yes.
Mr. Tavenner. Did you know Roy Hudson prior to that time ?
Mr. RossER. I met Roy Hudson at the school, and I have met him a
couple of times after that.
Mr. Velde. Mr. Rosser, I am afraid I wasn't very attentive at the
time you identified this school and the date of the school. Will you
reidentify that, please?
Mr. RossER. I left Los Angeles in November 1938 and I studied 6
months in the school, and I came back to Los Angeles about the 1st
of July 1939.
Mr. Velde. Where was the school held again ?
Mr. RossER. Upper State of New York.
Mr. Velde. On this large estate?
Mr. RossER. Yes.
Mr. Velde. That you don't know the name of the owner of the estate ?
Mr. Scherer. Near what city ?
Mr. RossER. New York City.
Mr. Scherer. Near what city in New York ?
Mr. RossER. New York City is the only one I know. There was a
little village down below, but I didn't know the village because I only
went to the village once.
3088 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
Mr. Tavenner. I believe you were giving us the names of the
teachers.
Mr. RossER. Yes. Jack Stachel.
Mr. Tavenner. S-t-a-c-h-e-1.
Mr. R.OSSER. That is it. He was a member of the national committee
of the Communist Party, and he spoke. Bittelman; Bittelman was
the ranking theoretician of the Communist Party, one of them, in
America.
Mr. Tavenner. Is that Alexander Bittelman ?
Mr. Rosser. Alexander Bittelman.
Mr. Tavenner. B-i-t-t-e-1-m-a-n?
Mr. Rosser. That is right; and then besides these leaders of the
national political bureau of the Communist Party who spoke on these
different subjects, we had a leader, a Communist — I don't know how he
got here, but he was from the German underground — and he spoke.
We had a person — they didn't tell us his name — who was in charge
of the work in Brazil, down through South America, who spoke, and
then we had a professor who spoke on the Communist position on
books, certain books and things like that, art.
Mr. Tavenner. I was about to ask you a few moments ago another
question with regard to Roy Hudson. You said you met Roy Hudson
several times after that school. Where did you meet him ?
Mr. Rosser. I saw him again at the 1938 national convention of
the Communist Party in New York. I met him again out in Los
Angeles in 1942, and then I saw him earlier. The first time I saw
Roy Hudson was in 1934, right after the maritime strike out here on
the coast.
Mr. Tavenner. I will ask you more about that later. Do you know
whether he was assigned to duty in the Communist Party to the
west coast at any time ?
Mr. Rosser. Well, all I can say is that Roy Hudson was responsible
to the political bureau of the Communist Party and the national com-
mittee for the work of the Communists in the trade-union movement
throughout America, which included the west coast, east coast, and he
was on the west coast many times.
Mr. Tavenner. Were you required to put in long hours of study at
this school, or was it just an easy course or cinch course as the students
in school would call it.
Mr. Rosser. No, we had a lecture and a discussion that lasted until
4 in the afternoon. We had a break for lunch and a break for time
out between 8 : 30 and 4, and then from 4 to 6 we relaxed and had our
dinner. Then after dinner we were broken up into groups, and these
groups discussed the material that we had discussed that day, and
those Communists in our groups who were weak and didn't understand
the party's position on certain things and how to apply them to the
American scene, those of us who did understand it, we tried to help
them out, and then a person in that group was assigned to write a paper
that night which he would read the following day in the class on
the group's understanding of what we had been taught.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Chairman, isn't that exactly the procedure
used by the Communists in Korea in their efforts to indoctrinate
prisoners of war ?
Mr. Velde. I would think you are certainly right.
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES EST THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3089
Mr. Tavenner. T think that was exactly the procedure.
Mr. ScHERER. That was just the testimony in New York 2 weeks
ago by boys who had been prisoners of war, the same procedure
identically.
Mr. Tavenner. Who paid your expenses?
INfr. Rosser. Well, Max Silver, the administrative secretary of Los
Angeles County, didn't give me the tickets. The tickets were given
to Bob Cole, Communist leader.
Mr. Tavenner. Bob who?
Mr. Rosser. Cole, C-o-l-e. I traveled with him, and they paid my
expenses to New York and took care of me while I was at the school.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you identify Bob Cole a little further, please?
Mr. Rosser. Well, Bob Cole for a time worked with Steve Nelson
up here in Alameda County, in the Communist Party up here in
Alameda.
Mr. Tavenner. Steve Nelson was the Communist Party organizer
of Alameda County?
Mr. Rosser. That is right, in the early forties.
]Mr. Velde. Did you know Steve Nelson?
Mr. Rosser. Yes, I knew him very well.
Mr. Velde. Of course you knew him as a member of the Communist
Party.
Mr. Rosser. Yes.
Mr. Velde. Do you know anything further about his activities
in connection with the University of California radiation laboratory ?
Mr. Rosser. The thing that I know about Steve Nelson is that I
met him in 1938. He had been to Spain, and then I met him when
he come out to Los Angeles, and he and I worked together, and
we had many discussions together about the Communist theory, and
then just before he got ready to come up to San Francisco on his
new assignment I was in a meeting with Celeste Strack and Andy
Charles and a person
Mr. Tavenner. What was the first name?
Mr. Rosser. Andy Charles, and a person by the name of Bob Chas-
son ; Andy Charles, Bob Chasson, and Celeste Strack
Mr. Tavenner. Will you give us the last name?
Mr. Rosser. Bob Chasson, C-h-a-s-s-o-n — were student leaders at
the University of California. They were head of the student work,
and Steve Nelson wanted to know from ns the names of students
that we had contacted during our activities in the Young Communist
League who were studying to be scientists, who were studying to be
chemists, mathematicians, and those connections we had at Cal Tech
and so forth. That was the only connection I had with that type of
activity that he carried on.
Mr. Tavenner. Did you give him the information he requested?
Mr. Rosser. Well, I didn't know those people well, but I am sure
they gave — they knew them because they were on the campus; they
were active participants and leaders of the Young Communist
League in the thirties on the campus of City College and USC, UCLA.
Mr. Velde. When you say "they," you are referring to Celeste
Strack and the others you just mentioned ?
Mr. Rosser. Celeste Strack, yes, and another one was Serrill Gerber.
3090 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
Mr. Doyle. May I ask this question there, Mr. Chairman? Do
you know from any records you have seen or otherwise approximately
how many students at the University of California or USC or Cal
Tech were members of the Young Communist League at the time
which you relate ?
Mr. KossER. I do not know.
Mr. Velde. Do you know Louise Bransten ?
Mr. RossER. No, I did not know her. I had seen her, but I didn't
know her personally.
Mr. Tavenner. Was the importance of yoUr training at this school
impressed upon you by any particular thing that was told you by the
Communist Party leaders as to the importance of your work?
Mr. Rosser. Yes, I think there were two things. One was Stachel,
Jack Stachel, when he lectured to us about the Communist Party and
our responsibility to the party and the need for a well-disciplined
party, he stated that we must understand that this training would
prepare us one day to be representatives of the Supreme Soviet of
America from the different States and cities, that we came from. Some
of us would be Senators, some Representatives, some would be mayors
in our city, and so forth, and that would create quite a discussion in
the school and in the groups ; and the other thing was in the discussion
by Bob Minor on the Communist position on war, where it was brought
out that — he said there is no possibility — but if we do have to go to
war with the Soviet Union, the loyalty of every Communist is to the
Soviet Union, that we would lead the American people in defeating
our own Government to protect the Soviet Union.
Mr. Jackson. Did the prospect of going to Congress cause any
defections?
Mr. RossER. Well, it had a lot of effects that a lot of people there,
I think — maybe I was carried away a little bit on the question of
power. It had its propaganda effects.
Mr. Tavenner. You have mentioned several times during the course
of your testimony that the teaching of the Communist Party was in
effect that when the time was ripe, any war in which the United States
may be engaged should be converted into a civil war and that the
fighting should turn against our own Government.
I have before me the book which you said was the subject of many
of these lectures. History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union,
and they taught that very thing in the book, did they not?
Mr. Rosser. That is right.
Mr. Tavenner. They taught, did they not, that that was the history
of the development of the Communist Party in the Soviet Union ?
Mr. Rosser. That is right.
Mr. Tavenner. They reasoned from that that when met with new
circumstances in this country, the same principles were to be applied.
Mr. Rosser. That is right.
Mr. Doyle. What book is that, Mr. Tavenner ?
Mr. Tavenner. That is the "History of the Communist Party of
the Soviet Union." I will read just this one sentence:
In opposition to the Menshevik and Socialist-Revolutionary policy of defending
the bourgeois fatherland, the Bolsheviks advanced the policy of
and this is in quotations —
"the defeat of one's own government in the imperialistic war."
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES EST THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3091
Is that a part which was used as a text in these teachings?
Mr. KossER. That is right. . ,
Mr. Tavenner. Then I refer, Mr. Chairman, with your permission,
to one section in the conclusion of this book. It is entitled
What does the history of the Communist Party in the Soviet Union teach us?
(1) The history of the party teaches us, first of all, that the victory of the
proletarian revolution, the victory of the dictatorship of the proletariat, is im-
possible without a revolutionary party of the proletariat, a party free from
opportunism, irreconcilable toward compromisers and capitulators, and revolu-
tionary in its attitude toward the bourgeoisie and its state power.
The history of the party teaches us that to leave the proletariat without such
a party means to leave it without revolutionary leadership ; and to leave it with-
out revolutionary leadership means to ruin the cause of the proletarian revolu-
tion. .
The history of the party teaches us that the ordinary Social Democratic Party
of the West European type, brought up under conditions of civil peace trail-
ing in the wake of the opportunists, dreaming of social reforms and dreading
social revolution, cannot be such a party.
The history of the party teaches us that only a party of the new type, a
Marxist-Leninist party, a party of social revolution, a party capable of pre-
paring the proletariat for decisive battles against the bourgeoisie and of organ-
izing the victory of the proletarian revolution, can be such a party.
You have testified about the Negro question as it was raised in these
various schools. Was there any special emphasis placed upon it in
this supersecret school, the national training school ?
Mr. KossER. Well, the emphasis placed on the Negro question at
this school was that we were in a new period ; we were in the period
of the united front; we were in a period where it was necessary to
mobilize the whole people in the fight against fascism. Therefore
for the time being the party would drop the slogan of self-determina-
tion of the Negro in the Black Belt and raise the immediate demands,
partial demands, of the Negro people — the right to sit on juries, the
right to a job, the end of discrimination in all public places, and the
restrictive covenants and so forth, and against lynching.
This was done in order not to offend anybody because during this
period the strategy of the party was to unite with everybody who was
opposed to fascism.
Mr. Tavenner. I think I should ask you a specific question at this
time as to how the subject of the use of force and violence was treated
in this supersecret school.
Mr. RossER. Well, in the party literature that was put out, the sub-
ject of force and violence was treated as a fact that if the workers
strike or if a Negro gets in trouble, he runs into the law, and there-
fore it is the capitalists who want to organize and start force and
violence. But in the national training school we were taught that
the only way to bring about a revolution was the arming of the workers
and that the only way a revolution could be successful was a revo-
lution that was fought with arms.
Mr. Tavenner. Was Peters' Manual used in that school also?
Mr. RossER. Well, if you will follow Peters' Manual, Peters' Man-
ual is the approach that the Communists had at that time from their
understanding of the teachings of Lenin.
Mr. Tavenner. You have had various experience in the Commu-
nist Party and positions from the lower level to the higher level of
the Young Communist League, the very top. Your rise seems to have
3092 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
been very rapid. What is the answer to that? How is it that you
progressed so rapidly in the Communist Party?
Mr, RossER. Well, my only understanding — the way I think about
it today is that I was willing, when I joined the Communist Party,
to carry out every decision of the party ; I was willing to take party
discipline, party decisions, carry them out, and because of my back-
ground, I had the key of opening a lot of doors for the Communist
Party — Negro churches, Negro organizations — and because I jumped
into the Communist Party work and worked at it 24 hours.
I gave up my family — I was engaged at the time to be married ; I
broke that oflP. I gave up the church I went to and moved right out
into the main stream as a street s]:)eaker and as an organizer for the
Communist Partj'^, carrying the Communist Party program of revo-
lution, and as a result I was advanced and trained by the party.
Mr. Tavenner. I would like for you to call upon your own ex-
periences in the Communist Party and tell the committee just how
the Communist Party applied to the American scene these various
teachings which you received and this training which you received,
particularly in the national training school of the Communist Party.
Mr. RossER. Well, when I first joined the Communist Party
Mr. Tavenner. I might say, let this be rather a liistory of your
participation in Communist Party activities.
Mr. Rosser. Wlien I first joined the Communist Party in 1932,
the Communist International had analyzed the world depression as
a special kind, a dej^ression that capitalism could not get out of unless
they went to war, and in this country the Communist progi"am was a
program of fighting against America going into the war. The Com-
munists in America said that the only way out of this crises of the
great depression was for America to join hands and go to war with
England and France, Germany ; go to war against the Soviet Union —
or for some of the capitalist countries in the world, England and
France, Japan, to fight Germany and so forth — or a war between
Japan and the Soviet Union.
Anyway, if there was a war between the capitalist countries, it
would be an imperialist war, and the party must have the American
people prepared to turn such an imperialist war into a civil war.
If it was a war against the workers' fatherland, the Soviet Union,
the American Communist Party must have the leadership of the
American people and must lead them to turn tlie guns against their
own Government and smash the attempt of the American Government
to destroy the Soviet Union. So with that line laid down, mainly
of defense of the Soviet Union, and a fight against the imperialist
war, the party's program was first that they sent out an open letter
to all the Communists from the national committee in 1933 to pene-
trate in all the basic industries of America.
Here in California the gang was longshorists, seamen, steel, agri-
culture, and besides the penetration into these organizations and
into the A. F. of L. unions, building Communist cells among the un-
employed, that the Communist build unemployed councils, and in
California, southern and northern, these unemployed movements grew
in proportions, and they led hunger marches to Sacramento, staged
big demonstrations in the streets before buildings, city buildings,
county offices. Federal sitdown strike in relief offices, picket lines —
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3093
issued all kinds of material, and all the material that the Communist
Party issued at that time was "Down with the imperialist war; de-
fend the Soviet Union ;" and during all this activity, penetration into
the unions, into the basic industries, and also the question of build-
ing Communist groups in the Army, Navy, and the police force, and
the National Guards, and among the Negro people during this time it
was a question of mobilizing the Negro people because the majority in
California who were unemployed were in the unemployed councils,
and in order to implement this work, street speaking, speaking before
factory gates, organization in the basic industries, the party put out
hundreds of thousands of pamphlets. In California we must have put
out a hundred thousand of "Why Communism ?"
"Why Communism?" was a pamphlet that spoke about the impend-
ing war, told the workers about the war, told them that they didn't
have to suffer like this, that capitalism could never plan, never get
out — they would have to go to war — and told them that the only way
out was the revolutionary overthrow of the Government and set up
a Soviet state.
Mr. Tavenner. Was it an inflammatory piece of propaganda that
was used to further the foreign policy and the aims of the Soviet
Union ?
Mr. RossER. That is right.
Mr, Tavenner. Is this the pamphlet to which you refer ?
Mr. RossER. That is right, "Why Communism?"
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Chairman, I desire to offer in evidence this
pamphlet entitled "Wliy Communism?" by M. J. Olgin, 0-1-g-i-n. It
is a very important piece of Communist propaganda which the witness
has described which was printed by the hundreds of thousands of
copies and distributed. I shall read only a few very short paragraphs.
In the chapter entitled "The Revolutionary Overthrow of Capital-
ism and the Dictatorship of the Proletariat" we find this language :
The overthrow of the state power, and with it of the capitalist system, grows
out of the everyday struggles of the workers. One is historically inseparable
from the other.
Then I skip to this paragraph :
Workers stop work, many of them seize arms hy attacking arsenals. Many
had armed themselves before as the struggles sharpened. Street fights become
frequent. Under the leadership of the Communist Party, the workers organize
revolutionary committees to be in command of the uprising. There are battles
in the principal cities. Barricades are built and defended. The workers' fight-
ing has a decisive influence with the soldiers. Army units begin to join the
revolutionary fighters, there is fratefnization between the workers and the
soldiers, the workers and the marines. The movement among the soldiers and
marines spreads. Capitalism is losing its strongest weaptm, the army. The.
police as a rule continue fighting, but they are soon silenced and made to flee by
the united revolutionary forces of workers and soldiers. The revolution is
victorious.
Armed workers and soldiers and marines seize the principal governmental
ofl5ces, invade the residences of the President and his Cabinet members, arrest
them, declare the old regime abolished, establish their own power, the power of
the workers and farmers.
I should like to introduce this and ask that it be marked "Rosser
Exhibit No. 6."
Mr. Velde. It will be admitted into the record at this point without
objection.
3094 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
(Pamphlet entitled "Why Communism?" by M. J. Olgin was re-
ceived in the record as Rosser exhibit No. 6. ) ^
Mr. Tavenner. Can you give us more concrete information as to
who was responsible for the circulation, the printing and circulation,
of that document and this propaganda ?
Mr. RossER. The national committee put it out first, and then the
State committee reprinted it and put it out in California, and then
the party units — every party unit had a quota of so many to distribute
and sell and pass out, and the Young Communist League also had a
quota.
Mr. Jackson, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Velde. Mr. Jackson.
Mr. Jackson. Mr. Rosser, does that substantially constitute your
understanding of the aims and doctrines of the Communist Party
during your period of membership ?
Mr. RossER. Oh, yes.
Mr. Jackson. Is there any reason for you to believe that those aims
or doctrines have been altered in any material degree since then ?
Mr. Rosser. Well, as the world situation changed, as it affects the
foreign policy or the defense of the Soviet Union, the policy and pro-
gram of the Communist Party changed. Sometimes they are pushing
this program of day-to-day revolution, and again they retreat because
there is a new situation, such as when Hitler came to power, they had to
change that, and they didn't — they tried to burn all those books.
Mr. Jackson. Thank you.
Mr. Doyle. Mr. Chairman, may T ask this : But you, sir, were in the
Communist Party from 1932 to 1944?
Mr. Rosser. That is right.
Mr. DoTLE. You were one of the top functionaries of the party
nationally as well as in the State of California. Was there ever any
publication by the Communist Party of America or of California
that contradicted this publication you have just testified as distrib-
uting in California which Mr. Tavenner has read?
Mr. Rosser. They didn't contradict it, but during the period of the
united front the only literature put out by the party was that the
main danger in the world was Hitler's fascism and that Hitler's fas-
cism was not only aimed at destroying the Soviet Union, but it was
aimed at conquering the world and enslaving the peoples of the whole
world and enumerating especially the Jewish people and the Negro
people, the African and the darker races, and the literature put out
by the party during that time was literature that aided the party in
building the front against fascism, and for the time being the party
dropped the question of immediate revolution.
Mr. Doyle. Am I correct that there was never any statement by
the Communist Party of America or in California that you know of
which contradicted this basic premise ?
Mr. Rosser. No.
Mr. Doyle. Which you testified to.
Mr. Tavenner. You have told us about the circulation of this docu-
ment. Will you proceed with describing other activities as a member
of the Young Communist League or official that related to the propa-
ganda aspect?
1 Retained in the files of the committee.
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3095
Mr. EossER. Well, in my work in the Young Communist League
during this period we followed the lines laid down by the Communist
Party because the Communist Party directed the Young Communist
League, and besides distributing the Why Communism ? we put out a
pamphlet, the State committee of the Young Communist League,
called Young Communists in Action, and this pamphlet
Mr. Tavenner. When was this ?
Mr. RossER. This was in 1934. This pamphlet was written by a
very intelligent, educated young Communist named Lew Miller.
Mr. Tavenner. Was that Lewis, L-e-w-i-s ?
Mr. Rosser. Yes; Lewis Miller. That was his party and Young
Communist League name. His real name is Louis Goldblatt. He is
now the secretary-treasurer of the International Longshoremen's and
Warehousemen's Union.
Mr. Tavenner. You say that Louis Goldblatt went by the Com-
munist name of Lewis Miller?
Mr. RossER. Yes ; in the YCL.
Mr. Tavenner. How do you know that ?
Mr. RossER. I worked with him in the Young Communist League.
I was on the county committee in Los Angeles with him.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you give us all the identifying information
that you can which would indicate that Louis Goldblatt is the same
person as Lewis Miller ?
Mr. RossER. Lew Miller, as I called him, was the educational direc-
tor for Los Angeles County for awhile for the Young Communist
League. He was also in charge of building Young Communist League
drill teams during the early thirties. We used to drill for two rea-
sons : One, teaching young Communists how to drill ; the other one,
defense squads to protect Communist street meetings and Communist
meetings if police happened to come to try to break them up.
Later on Lewis Miller, who has a brother also — I can't think of his
name — but his real name was Goldblatt. He moved to San Francisco.
Mr. Tavenner. Who moved to San Francisco ?
Mr. Rosser. Lew Miller and Louis Goldblatt, which is the same
person, and when I came to San Francisco in 1937 or 1938 to a State
meeting of the Young Communist League, I met Lewis Miller, Lou
Goldblatt — the same Lewis Miller — and he at that time was in the
warehousemen's union, and then again when I saw him in 1944 — I was
up here — he was the secretary -treasurer of the International Long-
shoremen's and Warehousemen's Union. That is the international.
I don't mean the longshoremen's union itself ; I mean the international
that is composed of the warehousemen's, fishermen, and longshoremen.
Mr. Velde. That is commonly known as Harry Bridges' union, is
that right?
Mr. RossER. Yes ; Harry Bridges is the head of it.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you describe the nature of this pamphlet which
was written by Louis Goldblatt, according to your testimony ?
Mr. Rosser. That pamphlet told of the international solidarity of
the working youth of the world — American with the youth of the
world — told that there couldn't be a dual leadership, the Young Com-
rnunist League and the Communist Party, and therefore the Commu-
nist Party was the main leader, and then it told of the organizations
3096 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
of the YCL, and it told the aim and the role of the Young Communist
League.
Mr. Tavenner. That paralleled the Communist Party line which
you have previously described.
Mr. RossER. That is right; the Young Communist League members
went into the shops; they aided the party and all kinds of things.
They built YCL shop units. On the campus we had Celeste Strack
and those people, Serrill Gerber, and they built — and up here we liad
in 1934 Aubrey Grossman, who is an attorney — they built YCL units
on the campus who fought against — who held antiwar strikes and who
indoctrinated the students with Communist propaganda,
Mr. Tavenner. You mentioned a person by the name of Grossman.
Will you identify the individual more definitely ?
Mr. Rosser. Well, I knew Aubrey; I met him in San Francisco at
a State meeting of the Young Communist League in early 1934, 1 think,
and he at that time was attending the University of Berkeley, and he
was a leader of the students. Young Communist League student work^
at Berkeley.
Mr. Tavenner. What was his full name, do you know ?
Mr. RossER. All I knew was Aubrey Grossman.
Mr. Tavenner. Aubrey, A-u-b-r-e-y.
Mr. RossER. Yes; G-r-o-s-s-m-a-n.
Mr. Velde. Mr. Rosser, over what period of time did you know Lou
Goldblatt to be a member of the Communist Party or the Young Com-
munist League?
Mr. Rosser. I knew him to be a member of the Young Communist
League and the Communist Party, we will say, from 1933 right on up
to 1944.
Mr. Velde. You have no further information concerning his activi-
ties in the Communist Party after 1944, 1 take it.
Mr. Rosser. No, I do not.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Grossman, I understood, was identified with the
University of California at Berkeley.
Mr. Rosser. That is right.
Mr. Tavenner. Is this the copy of the Young Communists in Action
to which you referred ?
Mr. Rosser. Young Communists in Action.
Mr. Tavenner. Written by Louis Goldblatt. Can you tell the com-
mittee who was responsible for the printing and distribution of this
document ?
Mr. Rosser. Well, the State committee of the Young Communist
League was responsible, and the Young Communist League — for the
printing, and the Young Communist League units were responsible
for the distribution.
Mr. Tavenner. To what extent was this propaganda effort ex-
tended ?
Mr. RossER. It was widely distributed.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Chairman, I desire to introduce the document
in the record and ask it be marked "Rosser Exhibit No. 7."
Mr. Velde. Without objection it will be admitted.
(Photostat of document entitled "Young Communists in Action"
was received in the record as Rosser Exhibit No. 7.)^
1 Retained In the files of the committee.
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3097
Mr. Doyle. Mr. Chairman, as that is introduced, may the witness
state what State committee of the Communist Party distributed this?
I assume it was California.
Mr. RossER. The State committee of the Young Communist League
of California.
Mr. Doyle. Thank you.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Chairman, I would like, before we close, to
read a few paragraphs from this document.
Mr. Velde. Proceed.
Mr. Tavenner. This is to indicate the propaganda value of it in
the Communist plan that has been described by the witness. I read
as follows :
The Soviet Union, with its tremendous achievement under a worliers' and
farmers' government, is an inspiration to the vporlcers throughout the world.
Just as the Russian workers, with the leadership of the Russian Communist
Party were able to free themselves from the yolie of tzarism and capitalism, so
will we in the United States, under the leadership of the Communist Party and
the Young Communist League, overthrow capitalism and build a workers' and
farmers' government — a Soviet America.
At another place I read as follows :
"If it is necessary to destroy the capitalist government, why do we take part
in elections?" you ask.
The Communist Party and the TCL have a definite purpose in taking part in
elections. To begin with, they afford us an opportunity to publicize our platform
and the demands of the working class.
Secondly, Communist candidates who are elected use their oflSce in order to
better carry on the fight to improve the conditions of the workers, and in order
to expose the capitalist governments and show the necessity for setting up a
workers' government. Lastly, the vote can be taken as a partial indication of
the strength and support of the Communist Party, even though we know that
many thousands of workers — Negroes, foreign bom, "paupers," soldiers, and
sailors — are denied votes or cheated out of them.
At another place it is stated :
We must explain to the workers the peace policy of the Soviet Union — a
peace policy that is permanent, honest, and consistent, because it is based on
the international solidarity of the working class. The U. S. S. R. is not in-
terested in securing colonies or conquering foreign markets. It is interested
in building socialism at home and in cementing relations with the workers in
other lands.
The peace policy of the Soviet Union, although it cannot abolish war alto-
gether, can greatly hinder the war plans of the capitalists against the U. S. S. R.
It can even postpone the beginning of such a war if it receives the active support
of the workers in the capitalist countries. Also, to hinder and put off the
counterrevolutionary war against the Soviet Union is in the immediate interest
of the workers because it gives the workers, farmers, and oppressed people
additional time in which to prepare for the revolution which will abolish all
wars. Finally, if war comes despite our struggle, we must by no means give
way to the illusion that war postpones or in any way lessens the class struggle.
On'the contrary, it is intensified, and it is our job to point the way to the free-
dom of the workers of all warring countries, especially to our own.
In this light we can understand how the Soviet peace policy is a revolutionary,
international policy — and can see the significance of the slogan "Defend the
Soviet Union."
Then, with your permission, just one further short paragraph.
Mr. Velde. Proceed.
Mr. Tavenner (continuing to read) .
41002 — 54— pt. 1-
3098 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
Only through militant struggle can we prevent the introduction of fascism.
The Young Communist League drill and defense squads have been formed to help
fight this menace. The defense squads are to protect meetings and demonstra-
tions, prevent the raiding of workers' clubs and headquarters by Fascist gangs,
and to organize the workers for self-defense. We must be alert to sense, report,
and conduct active campaigns against every Fascist step, and give our full
support to building the American League Against War and Fascism.
This organization, as the committee knows, was cited as one of the
most active Communist-front organizations in the United States.
Mr. Velde. Before recessing, the Chair would like to thank Mr.
Brooks and other officials of the city and county of San Francisco who
have been extremely generous in extending to us the use of this lovely
room for our hearings. Mr. Brooks has asked that during the noon
hour the hearing room be completely cleared, so the committee would
appreciate it if the physical audience present would abide by the
instructions or those requests.
At this point the committee will stand at recess until 1 : 45.
( Wliereupon, at 12 : 12 p. m., the hearing was recessed, to reconvene
at 1 : 45 p. m. of the same day.)
AFTERNOON SESSION
(At the hour of 1 : 50 p. m., of the same day, the hearing was
resumed, the following committee members being present : Represent-
atives Harold H. Velde (chairman), Donald L. Jackson, Gordon H.
Scherer, and Clyde Doyle.)
Mr. Velde. The committee will be in order.
Mr. Counsel, I have been asked by the press and various other per-
sons interested in this hearing concerning the subpena which was
issued for Louis Goldblatt some 3 weeks ago by this committee. Can
you tell me if the efforts to serve a subpena on Mr. Goldblatt have been
successful ?
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Chairman, the investigators and those helping
them have not been successful in serving the subpena, and we have been
advised within the last few hours that he has arrived in Honolulu, so
he is outside of our immediate jurisdiction.
Mr. Velde. Proceed.
TESTIMONY OF LOUIS ROSSER— Eesumed
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Rosser, you testified regarding the use that was
made of the Communist propaganda pamphlet entitled "Wliy Com-
munism?" and also the Communist propaganda pamphlet entitled
"Young Communists in Action," written by Louis Goldblatt. You
were asked a question by a member of the committee as to whether or
not the Communist Party at any time had disavowed either of these
pamphlets or their contents, and you replied they had not.
Mr. RossER. That is right.
Mr. Tavenner. Do you know whether or not these 2 pamphlets
represented the Communist Party line at that time?
Mr. RossER. It did ; at the eighth national convention of the Com-
munist Party in May 1934 in Cleveland the Communist Party passed
a resolution which resolution was exactly like the material in Wliy
Communism ? and Young Commimists in Action.
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3099
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Chairman, I would like to offer into evidence
a resolution of the eighth national convention of the Communist Party
at Cleveland, Ohio, April 2 to 8, 1934, which was just alluded to by
the witness and have it marked Kosser Exhibit No. 8.
Mr. Velde. Without objection it will be admitted at this point.
(Resolution of the eighth national convention at Cleveland, Ohio,
April 2-8, 1934, was received in evidence as Rosser Exhibit No. 8.)
ROSSER EXHIBIT NO. 8
[The Communist, May 1934, pp. 444 and 445]
Government Reading
The Pbesent Situation and the Tasks of the Communist Pabty of the U. S. A.
BESOLUTION OF THE EIGHTH NATIONAL CONVENTION, AT CLEVELAND, OHIO, APETL 2-8,
1934
The whole party must be aroused for a fight against the imminence of imperi-
alist war and intervention. The main task consists in unmasking the pacifist
cover under which war is being prepared by the Roosevelt government; in
exposing the role of pacifism of all brands without alienating honest pacifists
who are ready to enter into a militant fight against imperialist war ; strengthen-
ing the party and the revolutionary mass organizations in the decisive war
industries and in the harbors ; in carrying through mass actions for the stoppage
of the shipment of arms to Japan and China ; in defending the Chinese revolution
to the utmost, unmasking before the masses the counter-revolutionary role of
American imperialism and its oppression against the Chinese Soviets (sixth
offensive) and popularizing the heroic struggles and tremendous success of the
Chinese Soviet power ; in increasing the political educational work in the Army
and Navy and in the CCC camps ; and in widely explaining the peace policy of the
Soviet Union and exposing the counter-revolutionary propaganda of the Trotsky-
ite renegades and social-fascists. By our struggle against the danger of the
imperialist war, we must prepare to convert the imperialist war into civil war.
The eighth congress of the C. P. U. S. A. echoes the call of the thirteenth plenum of
the FCCI.— * * * which "calls upon all the workers and toilers self-sacrific-
ingly to defend the U. S. S. R. against counter-revolutionary conspiracy of the
imperialists and to defend the Chinese revolution and its Soviet power from
imperialist intervention."
Mr. Tavenner. The resolution reads as follows :
The Present Situation and the Tasks of the Communist Party of the U. S. A.
The whole party must be aroused for a fight against the imminence of imperial-
ist war and intervention. The main task consists in unmasking the pacifist
cover under which war is being prepared by the Roosevelt Government ; in expos-
ing the role of pacifism of all brands without alienating honest pacifists who are
ready to enter into a militant fight against imperialist war; strengthening the
party and the revolutionai-y mass organizations in the decisive war industries and
in the harliors ; in carrying through miiss actions for the stoppage of the shipment
of arms to .Japan and China ; in defending the Chinese revolution to the utmost,
unmasking before the masses the counter-revolutionary role of American im-
perialism and its oppression against the Chinese Soviets (sixth offensive), and
popularizing the heroic struggles and tremendous success of the Chinese Soviet
power ; in increasing the political educational work in the Army and Navy and
in the CCC camps ; and in widely explaining the peace policy of the Soviet Union
and exposing the counter-revolutionary propaganda of the Trotskyite renegades
and social-fascists. By our struggle against the danger of the imperialist war,
we must prepare to convert the imperialist war into civil war. The Eighth
Congress of the CPUSA echoes the call of the Thirteenth Plenum of the
BCCI, * * * which "calls upon all the workers and toilers self-sacrificingly to
defend the U. S. S. R. against counter-revolutionary conspiracy of the imperial-
ists and to defend the Chinese revolution and its Soviet power from imperialist
intervention."
3100 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
Mr. Rosser, you were explaining to the committee how the Com-
munist Party translated its teachings into actual practice as you ob-
served it during your vast experience in the Communist Party. I
think you have arrived at the point where you were beginning to dis-
cuss the united front action of the Communist Party. Will you begin
and proceed from that point?
Mr. RossER. During the year of 1935 Hitler became a threat
throughout the world and Hitler's Fascist Germany was threatening
the peace of the world. The Communist position was that Hitler was
built up by the capitalists of the world to destroy the Soviet Union,
and therefore, in order to protect the Soviet Union from attack by
Hitler and maybe the united capitalist world, the important tactic at
that time was not continuing to bring forward the slogan of "Down
with the imperialist war," "Convert the war into civil war," or "Make
an immediate revolution," but the tactic was to build the united front
against fascism.
Dimitroff, at the Seventh World Conference of the Communist In-
ternational, analyzed what fascism was and he, speaking for the
executive committee of the Communist International, called upon the
Communist Parties of the world, in each country, to unite with all
people who were opposed to fascism.
In America, the first meeting I went to where there was a discussion
of building a united front was a meeting called by the county com-
mittee of the Communist Party in Los Angeles, and it was made up
of the top leaders of the county committee and the top leaders of the
county committee of the Young Communist League, the party, and
the YCL, and at this meeting I met a person by the name of Max.
That is the only name I have ever known him by. Max was the inter-
national representative from the Young Communist International to
thi** country.
His job was to see to it that the Young Communist League was
built. Max gave a report on Dimitroff 's speech of building the united
front, and then in just a few words, it was that the Communist Party
must dress itself up ; it must go into all types of organizations, besides
penetrating into the unions and into the basic industries. It must
penetrate in all unions, A. F. of L., independent; it must merge the
led unions with the A. F. of L. unions; it must work in the churches
and in the fraternal organizations and all the civic organizations and
must work in all types of youth organizations. It must work in all
types of organizations of the Negro people and the nationalities in
this country, large groups like the Germans and the Yugoslavs and
Polish and the Mexican people, and in all this work it must raise
the slogan of the dangers of fascism, the question of uniting against
fascism, the question of helping to destroy fascism, and at the same
time point out the role that the Soviet Union was playing in the
worldwide scale of fighting against Hitler's fascism, and also we were
in the program of the party to take advantage of every situation.
At that time I was given a definite assignment to work completely
within the Young Communist League. My job was to build among^
the Negroes and the Negro community all types of organizations that
could rally the Negro young people in the fight against fascism. We
gave up the slogan of fi'eedom of the Negro people, the right of
people, the slogan of rebellion, and brought our new slogan of the
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES EST THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3101
united front, of the partial demands for the Negro people, jobs for
Negro youth, indiscrimination in schools, parks, and playgrounds in
the Negro community, all kinds of sports teams, and we built these
types of organizations. But on the broader scale, the united front
gave the Communist Party the opportunity to penetrate deeply into
the American organizations, and it gave the party an opportunity to
expand, and the Young Communist League, in the broader sense than
it ever had before.
For example, in the unemployed movement, before the whole drive
had been unemployed ; the councils had dealt mainly with the working
■class. But in the united front area the unemployed movement,
there were two groups. There was the unemployed councils by the
Communists and the unemployed leagues that were led by the Socialist
Party. The party maneuvered a merger, and a member of the
national committee of the party became head of the Workers' Alliance,
and they not only organized the workers, and the workers on WPA,
but they also organized the unemployed teachers into a professional
section of the Workers' Alliance, unemployed, all types of unemployed
skilled people, intellectuals, professional people, and in the Negro
community we organized the National Negro Congress, which was
headed by some of the most prominent Negroes in California, and
this organization was for democracy and down with fascism.
During this time 2 things happened. One was that the Communist
Party took advantage of the whole question of Ethiopia. Fascist
Italy invaded Ethiopia, and I had the job of building the Friends of
Ethiopia in the Negro community of youth leaders and adult leaders,
and we built a broad Communist-front organization called the Friends
of Ethiopia, and our job was to see to it that the whole community —
not just the Negro community, but the whole community, Negro and
white — participated in a campaign to the Government urging the
Government to stop shipment of oil, ammunition, war materials, food,
to Italy, because it was all being used against the Ethiopian people.
In our propaganda campaign we pointed out that the Soviet Union was
the one nation in the world that was taking the leadership in the
fight for the freedom of Ethiopia, of throwing the Italians out of
Ethiopia and calling for the quarantining of Italy.
At a meeting of this organization to aid Ethopia, when we were
discussing the Communist-proposed picketing of the Italian consul
in Los Angeles, one of the members, a non-Communist Negro leader
in Los Angeles, head of an important group, got up and said that
before we voted on this question of picketing the consul, that he
wanted to read a letter that he got from his organization in New York,
the head office, and a clipping from the New York Times, and he read
the letter, a short letter, saying that —
I sent you this clipping because I thought you would be interested. We had
the same problem in New York.
So he read the clipping, and the clipping said that it had been
brought to the attention that the Soviet Union was selling chemicals
and war materials to Italy, which was being used against the
Ethopians, and of course you can understand what this raised in
the committee, and of course we Communists tried to raise objections,
but this in Los Angeles and all over the country wrecked in a way
3102 COMJMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
the attempts of the party to build the Soviet Union as the leader of
the darker races.
During the united-front period we had the civil war in Spain, and
the party took advantage of this, and I had the assignment of recruit-
ing young members of the Young Communist League, Negroes, to go
to Spain, and we used the whole theory that Franco was a Fascist,
and this was the beginning of a war against fascism, and I personally
recruited quite a few young Negroes who went to Spain, who were
sent to Spain by the Communist Party, and some of them died in
Spain.
Mr. Tavenner. Let me interrupt you a moment there. The com-
mittee at this time is investigating other instances of a similar char-
acter, and the committee has been very much interested in learning
how passports were obtained for use by these recruits to the war in
Spain. Did you have any direct connection with anything of that
kind?
Mr. RossER. Well, my job, I would convince a young Negro to go-
Spain — this was in 1936 — and at the same time there was the seamen's
strike going on, and I went down to San Pedro, and I was able to
recruit quite a few Negro seamen, and after I convinced them to go
to Spain and fight, then I would take them to the office of the Young
Communist League to Mr. Jack Olsen, then the county organizer of
the Young Communist League, who took them over to another office
to see a man by the name of Lightner. As far as the passports, I
had nothing to do with that. My only job was to recruit them.
Mr. Tavenner. Do you have any knowledge of how they procured
passports, whether under their own names, or how it was done?
Mr. Eosser. Well, I think some of them procured passports under
their own names, saying they were going over as students. Some used
passports that other people were able to get, and so forth.
Mr. Tavenner. Proceed.
Mr. Eosser. Tlie united-front period, as I said, gave the Young
Communist League and the party an opportunity to broaden out.
We worked with all kinds of people, had all kinds of meetings, and
we recruited, and during the building of the united front the party
carried on a campaign. The party leadership nationally and the
Young Communist League saw that although we were building this
big front against fascism, and we had the American people on the
move, educating them for a hatred of fascism, we were not bringing
cut the face as a party. So the party during this period called for
an independent role in the party ; they called for the party clubs in
the neighborhood to not only build the front against fascism, but
at the same time in their own name come out for clean streets — the
Communists are for clean streets; the Communists are for play-
grounds; the Communists in the factory — if they were in the trade-
union movement — are for better conditions, make $1.25 an hour, or
safety, or those things. So the workers could see it was the Com-
munists who were leading this fight. In that way the Communists
could recruit, as they say in the parties, the best elements into the
Communist Party.
During the united-front period, although the party had dropped its
ultimate aim for the time being because Hitler had to be destroyed —
and that is the violent overthrow of this country — the party carried on
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3103
within the Communist Party itself a teriffic campaign of education of
Communist Party members. The Communist Party organized classes
and all kinds of discussion groups on the teachings of Marx, Lenin, and
Stalin, and the Communist Party expanded its schools and its workers
schools, all types of schools, in order to attract people, and this gave
the party an opportunity to educate thousands of Communists during
this period, and at the same time, the united-front period, which was a
period that they got from Lenin's books of how to retreat — Lenin
taught the Communists in 1905, when the revolution was over, crushed,
that in order to safeguard the party it was necessary to learn how to
retreat. So when Hitler came into power and the party felt that Hit-
ler was a tool of the capitalist world and they would move toward the
Soviet Union, they retreated a step, gave up for the time being — didn't
give it up completely — the liberation of the Negro people slogan and
the fight for the ultimate aim and brought out the slogan for the end
of facism, down with facism, and defense of the Soviet Union. But
at the height of this movement Stalin made a pact with Hitler in 1939,
and overnight
Mr. Tavenner. It was August 1939 ?
Mr. RossER. August 3 — and overnight the Communist Party
changed back to revolution. The party in a meeting that I attended —
the party's position was that the struggle going on in Europe between
Germany and France and England was a phony war and that at any
day it might be switched, and they all together move toward the
Soviet Union, and therefore the Communist Party in the Soviet Union
made a pact with Hitler which was a pact to gain time, to gear up its
defenses and mobilize itself if such a war would come, but in America
the Communist Party's job in the meeting was to build a big antiwar
movement. The main job of this movement, the basis, was defense of
the Soviet Union, but the main catch to mobilize the American people
was the slogan that this was not our war, keep America out of the
war; the Negro people have no stake in this war.
In a top meetmg that I attended there the party laid down the line.
I at that time had an assignment from the Communist Party in the
Workers' Alliance. I was one of the field organizers. My job at that
time was to organize and mobilize and lead huge demonstrations
every day, anywhere we could lead them, with thousands of un-
employed people, on the question that we want bread and not bullets.
(Representative Harold H. Velde left the hearing room at this
point.)
Mr. RossER. The unemployed movement demonstrated all over. I
was a part of a hunger march to Sacramento, and this big demon-
stration of the unemployed was a part of the party strategy to educate
the people against war.
In the unions the party's position was to foment slowdowns, to
convince the workers in the unions and the factories that this was not
their war, and to foment strikes. I sat in the meeting of the party
leadership on the North American strike in Los Angeles.
Mr. Velde. Mr. Rosser, at this meeting you mentioned where the
party line was laid down. Can you tell the committee who laid the
party line down, and if you know, how the party line was first origi-
nated or where it originated ?
Mr. RossER. Well, when Stalin made the pact with the Soviet Union^
it stunned the Communist Party, and for days the party locally did
3104 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
not make a statement, but the national committee of the Communist
Party made a statement, and then through the party's methods of com-
nniiiications with the Communist International, they finally got the
right answer that the war was a phony war, and the protection of the
Soviet Union, and to give the Soviet Union a breathing spell in order
to arm itself against Hitler — the national committee issued this proc-
lamation, and then this came down to the State committee of California,
came down to the county committee of Los Angeles, and then from
the county committee it went down into — that is the way the line was
laid down.
Mr. Velde. Do you have any information or knowledge as to how
the party line was handed down from the Communist International
to the Communist Party of the United States ?
Mr. RossER. I do not.
Mr. Velde. Proceed, Mr. Counsel.
Mr. Doyle. Mr. Chairman, may I ask this: The witness has re-
peatedly referred to the period of the united front. Are you able,
Mr. Rosser, to fix that period in years or months ? In other words, to
what do you refer as the period of the united front ?
Mr. Rosser. 1935 to August 1939. In the meeting wdiere we met on
the North American strike it was brought out that the Government,
the Roosevelt government, was going to bring in the Army to break
the strike, but the party's position was that whether they brought the
Army or not, this strike served notice that if the party had the correct
tactics, the working class would follow them, and this strike was a
strike that the party pulled in order to slow down the production of
airplanes in southern California.
Further, at that time our work among the Negro people was that the
Negroes in southern California especially — and northern — saw an op-
portunity to get jobs. They had been denied jobs in a lot of the in-
dustries of California and the Negro people saw an opportunity to
move in the industry. The Communist Party, in order to mobilize the
Negro people against the war — No. 1, we sabotaged every effort of the
Negro people on a "build the jobs" movement through the unions,
every effort of the non-Communist trade unions to fight for the rights
of Negroes on jobs during that Hitler-Stalin pact. We sabotaged
every effort of the Negro leaders on a "build the jobs" movement.
Further than that, in our propaganda to the Negroes we said that they
had no stake in this war, that there was no difference between England
and France, who had colonies and who exploited the Africans and
the Indians, and Nazi Germany, Fascist Germany who also exploited
the colored races. We called upon the Negroes not to give blood to
the Red Cross because they segregated the blood. We called upon
the Negro youth not to answer the draft call if there was a draft,
because the Army was segregated. Through all this work and all
this antiwar activities, at the same time we expanded the teachings of
the History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union because the
hard core of the Communist Party knew that the thing that they had
been talking about for years looked like it was at hand. That the
capitalist would was going to attack the Soviet Union, and if the
capitalist w^orld, America and England, joined with Hitler and
marched east, the Communists must be ready in this country during
the Stalin-Hitler pact to lead the American working class in an all-out
fight to turn their own guns against their own leaders.
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3105
Mr. Tavenner. Did a change develop in the policy ?
Mr. RossER. As we were pushing this policy right after the meeting
on the North American strike a few days later, Hitler moved east
and invaded the Soviet Union.
Mr. Tavenner. Just a moment. Before you go into that, at the
time of the North American strike did any higher officials of the Com-
munist Party commit themselves in any way upon the success of that
strike as to what it meant to the Communist Party?
Mr. RossER. Well, the top officials at the meeting I was at were
Matt Pelman, Paul Kline ; they were the organizers. They said that
it was a part of the Communist strategy at that time to fight against
the war. The North American strike was not the only strike that the
Communists pulled throughout the State of California. In southern
California we had the Vultee strike also in aircraft.
Mr. Tavenner. Pardon the interruption. Just proceed.
Mr. RossER. That is the end.
Mr. Jackson. Mr. Counsel, one question. Mr. Rosser, before leav-
ing the period of the united front, I would like to clarify my own
understanding of one piece of your testimony which I think is ex-
tremely important.
Did I understand you to say that when the sincere efforts of non-
Communist Negro leaders were directed toward alleviating unem-
ployment, toward creating a better situation, that those efforts were
deliberately sabotaged by the Communist Party?
Mr. RossER. That is right. They were deliberately sabotaged dur-
ing this effort. The only thing that the party had to hold the Negroes
in the antiwar camp was the question of jobs, and
Mr. Jackson. As long as they could keep them jobless and keep
them hungry, they were much easier to control ?
Mr. RossER. To propagandize to, that is right. In the period of
the united front, on the question of the expansion and how it worked,
there was a meeting of the county convention in Los Angeles in 1937,
and the Young Communist League introduced a resolution at that
convention, to show you how they expand. In that resolution the
Young Communist League pointed out that they would help organize
the CIO ; they would build all types of support organizations in the
CIO; and then at the State convention in 1938 in Frisco, we had a
meeting on the united front. This convention was presided over by
William Schneiderman. I was on one of the committees there
Mr. Tavenner. Just a moment, please. Mr. Chairman, I would
like to introduce in evidence the resolutions and proposals as adopted
by the Canada convention in 1937 alluded to by the witness and have
it marked "Rosser Exhibit No. 9," and also the proceedings of the
California convention in 1938, to which the witness has just referred,
and have it marked "Rosser Exhibit No. 10."
Mr. Jackson. Without objection the exhibits referred to will bo
received.
( Photostat of resolutions and proposals adopted by the Canada con-
vention in 1937 was received in evidence as Rosser exhibit No. 9 ; photo-
stat of proceedings of California convention in 1938 was received in
evidence as Rosser exhibit No. 10.)
3106 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
ROSSER EXHIBIT NO. 9
RESOLUTIONS
A K D
PROPOSALS
ADOPTED
AT
LOS ANGELES COUNTY CONVENTION
MARCH 27, E8, 195?.
FORWARD
TO THE FULFILLMENT OF
THE CONVENTION DECISIONS
(Part 1)
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3107
12
'ROHOSED nt$0LUT10:J OF VOI.K fMOm TrIE YOUH: TO L.A. CO. CO' VS' TION CO:i.U>aST rAhTY.
T'lo organization of Los Angeles into a 100J5 union town and the development
•of a peoples movement a ainst reaction will not I'e successful unless the younrer
feneration is mobilized in su-iport of these basic tasks co ifro'tinc; the people
and our party.
Especially now the tremendous percentage of youth in the basic industries of
Southern Caliiornia, (auto, marine, aircraft, steel agriculture, needle, etc.)
and v'ith thcever increasinp desire and mobilization of every section of the
youth for Q'.tion around their problems does this question assume major aifnlfl^
cencc for our Party in Los Angeles.
I. WIMMIWG THS YOT'TH FOR THE DRIVE TO OriGAMI2L T.OS /iMGELES.
Younf people can and so play an unportant pa t in the drive to orpanize Los
Angeles. Ibis vii-s rost evidenced by the influx of thousands of younr, workers
in the infiril.ino, aircriit, and other strike struggles just recently.
In v.'if.:;inj« c' tho_youth for the drive to orfanize Los Angeles, the Party mustj
1, IIolp tie YCL activities the many YCLers elepible for CIO and other Unions*
and help establish YCL orianization in the industries cuid shops. In the iimned--
'ate future the Part> must help establish YCL branches- in Aircraft ^nd Needle,
Assist and five guidance to those YCLers working in places where no party exists*
(American Can) in their efforts to esta lish a union.
2. Raise in the entire trade union movement the necessity for combatting
the concerted drive of the emj loyers who through sports, social and educational
prorrams attempt to keep the youth away from the trade unions; a. ^y helping
to initiate in the labor noveraenO a propram of social, recreational and sports
activity, (in Son Pedro a recreational center around the maritir-e unions; In
Los Angeles sports and recreational activities around the needle trades, studio
and woodworking unions.
3. tiobilir.e our fractions to get the support of the trade unions around the
campaign and issues of the youth such as the Campaign for the C^ifomla Youth
Act.
Participation and supcort in the anti-war actions on May 30th support
for the 4th Ar.erioan Youth congress in Milwaukee throufh endorsement , financial
help, .and for the sendinf of delerates from these unions with a largo youth
membership.
4, To assign all younf comrades in trade unions as their major responsi-
bility the joi of developing youth activity and win in the youth for the trade
unions. OUR ruTiTY ?RACT10t!3 KUST UTILIZE EVERY AVAILABLE YOUNt COMRADE lOR 1-SE
WORK Of WHiNING Trie YOUTH KOH Tlffi PROGRESSIVE TR^XDE UNION WOVEKENT,
£, In all sections to help the YCL become of real service to the drive to
organize Los Angeles by helping to mobilize all youth and youth organization la
support of all struggles, especially in the collection of relief, assistance on
picket lines; help inaugurate a drive to win the eligible young people in the
large mass organizations of youth for membership in their trade unions; and to
get the assistance of these organizations in the organization drive to unionise
Los Anpeles,
(Part 2)
3108 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
13
Southern California youth have taken ig steps in the direction of united
action arainst Avar, facism and insecurity during the past year. (Examples t
The California Youth Act campaign involvin/' organizations representing 50,000
LA youth; the movement for independent political action involving top leaders
of church and Younf Democratic orfanisationsi The United Student Peace Committee
preparing for Student strikes against wari the campaign to aid Spanish Democracy,.
4tc.
The Los Anpeles YCL has played an important part in uilding these movements,
''herever young profressives gather they are learninfr. to work Y;ith and welcome
the line of the Communists. During the cominr. few months the YCL must strenithen
its connections with the rost important procrossives youth organizations l^ke
the Y's, churches. Young Democrats, etc.
It must work to mobilise the youth represented in these united fronts,
especially around:
1. - The Fipht to pass the California Youth Act.
•2. - United Jar Actions amonr; tho students on April 22nd; amonp all May 30th
3. - >ourth HationeJ American Youth Conrress July 4th.
4.- Municipal L_e,f islative Youth Conference after the Municipal elections;
THE PARTY UST;
1.- Assist hy essigninF forces to adult organiiations worklnr among the
youth, such us the Parent Teachers A socl'tions] and in assigning young party
forces to the Younr Democrats.
2. -Dy helping in all sections to mobilize all organisations and trade unions
in support of these campaigns.
III. RUILDINC THE YOUNG COMMUNIST LaAOUE
Through the connections it has established and as a result of the beginning
made in reconstructing the YCL into a mass orr^anization, more democratic, trying
to cater to all the social, educational, cutural and sports desires of the
youth, the UCL has recruited hundreds of new youth and has doubled its member-
ship during the last 8 months.
1. If the YCL is to hold its members emd grow in size and influence further
it must develop a more experienced collective leadership capable of solving the
many complex problems. The Party must -ay serious attention to -fhe educktion,
guidance and developments of the league leadership in all sections.
2. The Party must pive real help in the reconstruction of the League and
in the developinr of diverse activities in the Leapue by utilizing specialists
who can fi-ve the League the rich life a mass young organization must have.
(teachers, artists, musldisBf .dram^itists, physical culture directors, etc.)
3. The Party must immediately strenrt)»en its connections with and its
guidance to the YCL comrades, especially in sections like Goodyear, Harbor,
San Fernando, FP (where some of the best possi ilities exist for 'luilding the
YCL). I'.onthly Joint nestings of the YCL and party 'uros must be utilited in
aiding the league and to familiarize the part leadership with the problems con*
fronting us in our v/ork among the youth. In all sections a leading comrade
attached to the Buro must be made responsible for the building of the YCL with
the Party, for bjrinpinF youth proMems into the Party; and for brinj-ing Party
campairns before the youth. Our slogan must be, "NO PARTY CAMPAKN IS COMPLETE
UHLISS IT nnACHGS THE" YOUTH" I
(Parts)
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3109
14
In order to co-ordinate and puic'e the ?/ork ol the Youth Directors, the
Party must set up a countx-Jtouth Counission responsible for work amonr Lne
^outh in 1j\ oounty
4. The Pai-ty must t\r. part of its drive to build the Party, ul.so pay roal
attention to building y.hc LeaRue; especially in the Goodyear, Harbor, and Ind-.is-
trial i;bctions. To sot a quote of 250 mcnbers (noT/) by the tarty this year,
(soi e coctjons lil.o Goodyear, Belvo-.'ore and Lincoln Heights hare set a tood
exeu.iplo.)
ir ve ai-o to utilize the st-lemlid possibilitioa that exist for building tho
leafue via must 'uarantoe tl.at all sections acsifn all young people for r'ork
nmonfi the yoi'th,
5, Our language dopartmcit and our fraction secretaries in ill raciss orrani-
iations must guuraiiteo tliat in anO around all mass organizations^ a real dri've
is made to orpinize the youth.
IV. PTiEPARE 7HK NJATIOHAL AMD -ST/.TE CONVENTIONS OF THE YCL;.
In May afid Juno respectively, '-.ho n. tional am' state co.ventions of the
YCL convene. The Purty must: (a) earry tlirough in all units and sections commit-
tee discussions on the issues confronting tho convention and on the problems of
party work among the youth, (h) Give concrete assistance to the Leapuo in nre-
parinf, these conventions both ^n the discussions and in the technical prepara-
tions necessary.' (c) Since tho state convention will be held in Los An, elcs in
June to make May K-rty Youth month, in ordor to mo^"ilize tho v/idest mar.ses of y
youth for the nnti-war actions on May 30th and in order to utilize the co iven-
tion preparations to bring the YCL before the broadest masses of Youth.
(Part 4)
3110 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
29*
We Just say that In the last period our eeotlons and units have not done
sufficient on this score. Very few leaflets have been issued, and the quality
of our leaflets were not entirely satisfactory. This line of activity must bo
greatly improved.
1. Sections and units should issue at least one leaflet every month.
Sections should concentrate on issuing monthly neighborhood bulletins on
territorial and general issues.
2. Particular attention should be paid to issuance of leaflets, and bulle-
tins in connection with the organiiation of the unorganized Trade Union Unity
and support of the C.I.O. on independent political action through development
of a people's front; the legislative program of our Party, the people's legis-
lative conference,, etc.
3. The Industrial Section and units must pay particular attention to^.thlo
phase of work.
4. Holding as often as possible open unit meetings inviting non-party
people. Open air meetings and rallys, open forums, etc.
5. Mass distribution of our Press and pamphlets in T.U's, shops, f&ctor^e^,
mass organizations, etc.
SCHOOLS AND CUSSES
1. In 1937 w« should hold at least one Full Time Training School Tby
October) and two part time schools (one trade union comrades in the Industrial
Section) around July (T.U.) and December (general). To make possible these
schools will take place as planned, each section should at once assign one
comrade to a county wide school committee to begin the selection of students
and collection of funds. The unit educational director should be responsible
for this work in the units. The campaign for the schools should start not
later than July 4th. V/ith every section at once setting itself a quota for
funds and students.
2. Much more care must be taken in working out the school programs to
siit local requirements. Greater care of selection of students to assure
the development of the needed forces: Native American Trade Unionists,
mass workers, Negro women and youth. Comrades to be sent to schools be
not cimply those "we can spare" but those that need and deserve to be edu-
cated and developed for work.
3. Harbor, Goodyear, Hollywood and Eastside should organize classes
on a section scale. Harbor should consider a full time section school in
1937.
4. Branches and units should organize classes or study groups for basio
Party theory or study of Party documents drawing in non-Party people as well.
These to be outside of unit meetings. Wider reading of Party press and
literature by our membership must be fostered to raise the political level
of our membership.
5. Special attention must be paid to developing teachers for our schools
and classes to meet the ever increasing demands in this field of work.
(Parts)
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3111
.30
6. The Workers' School lauat te utilized much more than is the
case now as p form of Perty education. Each branch nnd unit should
assign at least 3-5 coirrades to attend the workers school, releasing
these cornrfldes of some other work to make their study -oossible.
7. For active trnde unionists, unable to Pttend full time or part
tine schools, special classes, small study proups or individu.-^l study
must bo org'nized to fit their time convoniences or other reruir'^'nents.
8. Special j>«isi3tance to the YCL in developing people able to build
and lead a brord youth movement. T7e ohould h'lp the YCL to org'nize
at least one full time tro we°!-s county training school and one class
in higher education for leading comrades in 1937.
9. Setting up of county research comtiittee to study and provide ua
Tiith material of general end labor conditions in L. A, Coiujtr.
10. Training of New Party nenbpra. Hot one Party merber should start,
his regular party vork without having gone thru a new members cl^ss.
a) The establishment of new Party m-nb'^rs cl-'sses or imits in every
section,
b) Holding of monthly meetings rith the teachers of new members
classes or leaders of units must be most crefu^ly chosen from amongst
some of the most capable comrades.
c) Teachers of new members classes or leaders of new members units
should, upon completion of course discuss with each new members his fur-
th?r study and type of work he prefers end is best qualified to do. Thi^
to be transmitted to section and units and have definite follow up to
effect these recom-'^ndations.
d) Older and better developed comra'^es must make the development of
ner comrades their special duty— . having discussions with tham, encouraging
rerding, ect.
e) Special care must be taken in establishinf new members classes
in the Industrial section. In some cases, because of the danger of
exposure, these classes may have to b" organized on a unit instead of a
section scale.
THK JSVEIOPKKMT OF laAJING PERSOMWEL
The Co\inty Committee should have personal contact rrith the leadin/j
people in the sections, units and fractions by:
1. Carefully studying the functionaries in the sections, units and
fractions, cUscussintj with them their work, finding ou«- whether the rork
they are engaged in meets with their capabilities and choice; their per-
sonal problems, etc. Find^out froov them the composition of the bodies they
represent, seeking thus to discover more people for development
promotion and work.
2. Holding monthly meetings with all functionaries in the units and
fractions to discuss general party problems and work.
3. ^ Leading committees should carrj' thru periodical examination of
the work of leading comrades, where friendly criticism and self-criticism
of shor- comings, comradely encouragements find evaluation of achievements
should ensue.
(Parte)
3112 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
ROSSER EXHIBIT NO. 10
PROCEEDINGS
OP
IFE CALIFORNIA CONYFNTION
IIAY 14, 15
^
COMMUNIST PARTY"
(Parti)'
Mr. EossER. At that meeting in San Francisco in 1938 there were
quite a few outstanding Communists there that I knew: William
Schneiderman, head of the Communist Party; Oleta O'Conner Yates,
one of the State leaders of the Communist Party ; Anita Whitney, one
of the State leaders; Pettis Perry, one of the State leaders; Paul
Kline, one of the St ite leaders, the county organizer of Los Angeles;
myself.
Mr. Tavenner. T\ 3re you one of the presiding committee at that
convention ?
Mr. RossER. Yes, I was. At that meeting I think Walter Stack
was on the presiding committee. He is a trade unionist here in San
Francisco; Al Yates is a trade unionist here in San Francisco — he
was at that meeting.
Mr. Tavenner. Do you recall whether Roy Hudson was one of the
honorary presidium, one of the honorary presidium ?
Mr. Rosser. Yes, I think they named quite a few
Mr. Tavenner. Let me hand the exhibit to you to refresh your recol-
lection. Do you see the name of Roy Hudson as one of the piesidium ?
Mr. Rosser. Yes, I do ; Roy Hudson, it is there.
Mr. Tavenner. Were there also represented there representatives
from France, China, and other countries ?
Mr. Rosser. Representatives from China, Soviet Union — they
weren't representatives, but they were honorary members of the pre-
siding committee — from Spain, from China, from the Soviet Union.
(Representative Harold H. Velde returned to the hearing room at
this point.)
Mr. Rosser. This meeting was the last meeting that the Commu-
nists had on the united front, and as I said, Revels Cayton, a leading
Negro in the maritime work here in San Francisco, was there — he is
in the Marine Cooks — and Hugh Bryson, a leading member of the
Marine Cooks and Stewards, was there; Dick Criley, at that time the
State president of the Young Communist League, a graduate and
letter man from the University of California.
1 See p. 3113 for Part 2, Rosser Exhibit No. 10.
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3113
ROSSER EXHIBIT NO. 10
Pag'
e 2
CALIFORNIA STATE CONVH^'TION MINUTES
First Session
ELECTIONS
1. Honorary Presidium:
Joseph Stalin - Soviet Union
Georgi Dimitrov-Comintern
Earl Browder - C. P. U.S.A.
';im, Z. Foster- C.P.U.S.A.
James W. Ford- C.P.U.S.A.
Mother Bloor
Roy Hudson
Kuus inen
Mao Tse Tang
Chu Tosh
Jose Diaz
C.P.U.S.A.
C.P.U.S.A.
S07let Union
Chinese C.P.
Chinese C.P.
Spanish C.P.
LaPasionara - Spanish C.P.
Ernest Thaelmann-German CP
Comrade Thorez - French CP
Tom Mooney
J. B. McNamara
Comrade Prestos-Brazil CP
Comrade Laborde-^Jexican CP
Tim Buck - Canadian CF
Toledano - tlexican Unions
Gil Green - YCL
P. Perry - California
2. Presiding Committee:
Anita Whitney
Vta. Schneidernan
E. Hanoff
Paul Cline
Frank Specter
George L^aurer
Comrade Brazil
E. Richardson
D. Ralston
Frrnia Cutler
M. Crawford
Comrade Nishi
Walter Stack
Comrade Germanie
Arcus Reddock
Al Marsh
Al Moyer
Comrade Don
Dick Criley
Lou Rosser
Harrison George
Comrade Salgado
Sam Young
^fery Butler
Recesa for Meeting of Presiding Committee
FIRST S E S SIGN - C 0 N T I N U E D
REPORT
Chairman - George tourer
I
BUILDING THE DEMOCRATIC FRONT IN CrtLIFORKIA - by William
Schnelderman, State Secretary.
Recess - 5 minutes
DISCUSSION
Oleta O'Connor
San Francisco. Extended remarks on organi-
zation of election caiiq>algn.
G. Ashby - Los .i^eles. On coordination of activities in
assembly districts.
Bob Cole - San Pedro. On building the democratic front in
the Los Angeles Harbor.
Adjournment for lunch
(Part 2)
Mr. Tavenner. Will you spell the last name, please ?
Mr. RossER. C-r-i-1-e-y, Dick Criley, he was there and there were
many other Communists that I knew who were at this convention.
It was a State convention of the Communist Party.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Rosser, the contention is sometimes made by
those who advocate communism that it is a political party. I would
like to ask you, in light of your vast experience in the Communist
Party, is it a political party in the sense that we understand that term
in political science in this country as distinguished from an interna-
tional conspiracy ?
Mr. Rosser. No, it is not a political party. The party takes part in
politics and election campaigns when they think that it is necessary
41002. — 54. — pt. 1— — 5
3114 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES EST THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
to promote the program of the party. When I say "take part," I mean
as the Communist Party, but the party is tied up with the Commu-
]iist International of the world, with the Communists of the world, and
they use the politics to bring out the phase of the party, to bring out
the program of the party, or to bring out some struggle that the party
is interested in. The party not only works as a unit as the Commu-
nist Party, but within each of the political parties in America.
When I was the acting president of the Young Communist League
for a few months, I had the responsibility of directing the fraction
down in Los Angeles, a meeting of the fraction with the Young
Democrats and meeting with the people who worked in the Young
Republicans, and so the party not only works as the Communist Party
itself, but it works that way.
Further, the party is tied up, and I think we showed it this morning,
with the Soviet Union and therefore it is not a party in the sense, but it
is a part of the conspiracy whose major aim is the overthrow of cap-
italism throughout the world, and of course, in understanding Lenin-
ism, Lenin teaches the party under all kinds of conditions how to
work. You will see that the party in America does not work like the
party in France. In France and in Italy the main drive is to elect
people to the French parliament, the French Government, but in
America it is all right, but this is not the important thing in America,
but the party takes part as the condition arises as to how the party
works. Sometimes the party's program in the election is for legal
work there on the ground, but as a political party in America, no,
because there are so many — well, the party has all types of organiza-
tions.
In a union they have the open Communists and then they have the
hidden Communists like in other organizations. This is true all over.
Right now the Communists have Communists out in the open, and then
they have the underground.
Mr. Tavenner. Now, you have spoken of the purpose of the Com-
munist Party through its instructions to the Young Communist
League to infiltrate various organizations.
Did you participate in any of those progi^ams of infiltration?
Mr. "Rosser. Yes, in 1936 when in California we were fighting to
make the party legal, it was decided in a meeting of the state com-
mittee of the Young Communist League that in southern California
we had the best opportunity to establish a legal front, established
either by the county coimcil or board of supervisors or some govern-
mental agency, and so therefore we planned to call a conference. We
worked out a plan where we were able, through our fellow travelers
and our people around the party who had prestige, to get the board of
supervisors to call a meeting on the problems of underprivileged
youth, and because this meeting was called by the board of supervisors,
we had every type of youth organization in southern California:
Baptist, Methodist, Catholics, trade unionists, YMCA, Elks, Masonic
Youth, Boy Scout leaders — all types of youth organizations, and the
Young Communist League. It was only out of about 400 people-
there were only officially about 5 members of the Young Communist
League there. " One member came from Hollywood. He was a young
budding actor. I was there, only as a representative of the county
committee of the Young Communist League. We had a person by
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3115
the name of Elsie Monjar, who came from the Christian Youth Coun-
cil, and a person by the name of Mort Newman, who came from the
Methodist Youth. He was a leader in the Communist underground,
Young Communist League, in the Methodist Youth, a hidden Com-
munist.
At that meeting we were able to sway these 300 young people and
the board of supervisors to set up a county youth commission. The
job of this youth commission was to make a survey of the problems of
youth and make suggestions as to what the board of supervisors could
do. In the election of the committee, the county youth commission, I
was elected by the majority of young people there as one of the mem-
bers of the Los Angeles County youth commission.
Now, tlie main thing that this did to us, it gave the Communists
an opportunity to use the official stationery of the Communist Party
to really start the building of the California youth legislatures and
other things in California. We sent out calls on the official stationery,
and my name was on there, member of the Young Communist League,
and all these other people.
I also worked in the building of young Democratic clubs. I also
worked in the building of the Communist groups in the YMCA and
the Negi^o organizations and the National Association for the Ad-
vancement of Colored People. We maneuvered that the president
was a Young Communist League member and so forth. I had quite
a bit of experience.
Mr. Jackson. Mr. Rosser, you mentioned the five members of the
Young Communist League. One, I believe you said, was a young
budding actor. Who was that ?
Mr. RossER. His name was Maurice Murphy.
Mr. Jackson. Did you name the others by name ?
Mr. RossER. Yes.
Mr. Jackson. Thank you.
Mr. Doyle. May I ask this question, Mr. Chairman ?
Mr. Velde. Mr. Doyle.
Mr. DoTLE. Wlio was responsible for negotiating the arrangements
for this meeting of the board of supervisors in Los Angeles County?
Mr. RossER. Well, one of the top leaders in the Christian Youth
Council who had contact with all the ministers and churches, Miss
Elsie Monjar, and Mort Newman. She was a member of the Young
Communist League; Mort Newman, who was one of the leaders of
the Methodist Youth ; and the people that they were able to contact,
and some of the people of the Communist Party through the trade
unions and so forth.
Mr. ScHERER. I would like to go back to that phase of your testi-
mony about which Congressman Jackson asked you a few moments
ago. When you said that when it suited the party's purposes, they
sabotaged efforts to get Negroes jobs and accomplish those other pro-
grams which were for the betterment of the Negro race, what was
your reaction to that at that time?
Mr. RossER. Well, I was in a confused state ever since the national
training school. For the first time since I had been in the party, at
the national training school I came up face to face with that thing
that they call Communist Party discipline. I had never met it really
3116 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
before. I had heard about it, and I had seen people disciplined, and
I had been in meetings where people had been chastised for not doing
this and not doing that, but I had never really run up against it like
a stone wall where all these people you felt were your friends all at
once look like they are ready to shoot you.
Christmas Eve, the night before that, a couple of days before that,
Bob Minor or somebody had spoken on the question that if Russia
attacked, we went to war with Russia, we American Communists
would have to turn the guns against our own Government, and Christ-
mas Eve while ice skating I was asking Morgan Hull, the California
Communist, and some of the others did they agree with this person
on the position, the Communist position, that our first loyalty was to
Russia, and he asked me back, who was I loyal to, was I loyal to Stalin
or Roosevelt; was I loyal to the Soviet Union or America, and of
course, knowing Communist Party politics, I quickly said, "Well, I
am loyal to Stalin." So then Morgan Hull saw that we were going
to get in an awful thing, and he said, "Well, let's have a Christmas
party," and I said okay, and I had been receiving money from some
of the top fellow travelers in southern California, Christmas presents,
sent me presents of money, so Morgan Hull was getting his check
from the Newspaper Guild — he had money.
Mr. ScHERER. You mean these Communists were observing Christ-
mas?
Mr. RossER. Well, we — Morgan and I proposed that. So we decided
to break — first we broke a decision and went down in the village and
bought a lot of food and bought some drinks and came back, and
there was about 25 Communist students at the school. The rest had
been given permission to go to New York, and we had a party.
The next morning part of the control commission was out at the
national training school. They held a meeting, and they discussed
with us the breaking of the party decisions. That Monday they held
a meeting of the whole student body, and the person that came out —
I forgot his name now — discussed Communist Party discipline. He
said that without Communist Party discipline the party could never
carry through a successful revolution.
Mr. ScHERER. What year was this that you began to waver?
Mr. RossER. This was in 1939.
Mr. ScHERER. But you stayed in the party until 1944?
Mr. RossER. That is right. And so in my group they went after me
for about 2 days to make a statement, and finally after hammering it
home that I had broken a decision, that I had betrayed the Negro
people and the working class, I wrote a statement, and the statement
was that I, Lou Rosser, had broken party discipline; I had betrayed
the Negro people ; I had endangered the security of the national train-
ing school and betrayed the working class, and that any decision
made by the control commission I deserved it, and that began to make
me think.
Mr. ScHERER. Wliat decision did they make then ?
Mr. RossER. They made a decision that when I got back to Los
Angeles, instead of going into a top functionary of the party immedi-
ately, I should work in the unemployed movement. That is a day-
to-day, hard task that they made — —
Mr. ScHERER. You mean, that is how you were disciplined ?
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3117
Mr. EossER. That is the way I was disciplined.
Mr. ScHERER. Your punishment.
Mr. RossER. But it opened my eyes, because for the first time I
saw me on 1 side and 49 other Communists on the other side, besides
3 — there were 3 of us in this deal, and so then I began to think, and
then when we reached this point where the party
Mr. ScHERER. Let me interrupt again. That memorandum you
signed, that wasn't true, was it ?
Mr. RossER. What?
Mr. ScHERER. Was it true, that memorandum or that confession
you made?
Mr. EossER. Well, at that time — that is the party's thinking. After
I sat in a group and 6 people just hammering on you all day for 2
days — this line, "You broke a decision ; you endangered the national
security of the school, the party discipline"— finally I broke down and
wrote the decision — wrote the
Mr. ScHERER. You did because of that pressure that was put on?
Mr. EossER. Well, I guess so. And then when they made this de-
cision that Ave should see to it that Negroes didn't get jobs, it kind of
upset me, and I got worried, and to show you for the records, if we
had them here to date, when the Eoosevelt Committee on Fair Em-
ployment Practice had its first hearing a few months later in Los
Angeles, only 38 Negroes had been hired by the defense industries
in Los Angeles, and most of the defense industries were under the
control of the CIO where the party had an opportunity to stifle the
integration of Negroes.
Mr. ScHERER. You found out at that time that the Communist Party
actually was anti-Negro, didn't you ?
Mr. EossER. Well, I began to open my eyes, but when
Mr. ScHERER. That was the first time you began— —
Mr. EossER. Yes, it was beginning. I was beginning to be-
come
jNIr. ScHERER. It became anti-Negro when it suited its purpose,
didn't it?
Mr. EossER. That is right.
Mr. ScHERER. You learned that to be a greater truth — call it a
greater truth — as years went on then, didn't you?
Mr. EossER. Yes.
Mr. ScHERER. This was about when ? 1940, you say ?
Mr. EossER. This was 1939 and 1940.
Mr. ScHERER. How is it you stayed in the party until 1944 ? That
is what I am interested in.
Mr. EossER. Well, when Hitler marched on the Soviet LTnion, the
party line changed overnight. The party said :
Every man and every woman, every child, must be used for manpower to sear
this big arsenal of democracy. We have to see to it that the Soviet Union, Eng-
land, France, are given guns, food, ammunition, given all those things that are
necessary to destroy Hitler.
And we had to go back to the Negro people and say it is all right
to give your blood to the Eed Cross because this is a different kind
of war ; it is a war of liberation ; it is a war of freedom ; they have
attacked the Soviet L^nion, and in the fight for jobs the Commu-
3118 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
nist Party set down a rule tliat instead of picketing like we had
been doing- in 1938, 1939, for jobs, picketing organizations, we had to
sit down over the conference table and use the power of the unions
and the interested industry with the Government agencies to see that
Negroes were integrated through the FEPC Act by Roosevelt into
the war industries.
Mr. SciiERER. What caused you tnen finally to break with the party
in 1944? Or am I going too fast for you, Mr. Counsel? Do you
have that ?
Mr. Tavenner. Well, we would have reached it, but I guess since
you are at this point, we might as well
Mr. RossER. What caused me to break with the party : The party
raised the point during this period of Hitler's attack on the Soviet
Union that we must fight for jobs, but we must see to it that the Ne-
gro organizations do not go out of bounds, and to give an example,
the Negro press kept present, even during this time, that the FEPC
that Roosevelt signed was too weak, Executive Order 8802. It didn't
have any teeth in it, and Randolph, a leader of the Pullman porters
and the Negro people, and Walter White kept pushing for Roose-
velt to put teeth in it, and the Negro press carried a campaign of
double V ; victory at home and victory abroad. This double V pro-
gram. The party got sore because the party was carrying a pro-
gram of open the second front, and the party felt that the program of
these Negro leaders and the Negro press — the leaders of America
would think that the Communists were pushing these programs. So
in a meeting of the Negro commission in southern California it was
decided that, and I am sure this came from New York, we should put
pressure on the Negro press by getting prominent Negroes to write to
Roosevelt and to the Justice Department that the Negro press was in-
flammatory, and it was dividing the war effort ; it was against the war
effort.
Randolph had threatened to march on Washington during the Hitler
pact. He had threatened to march a hundred thousand Negroes to
Washington if they didn't sign an FEPC, and aft«r they got it, he
threatened again to get teeth in it. The Communist Party said that
he had to be muzzled, and he was coming to Los Angeles in 1942, and I
and Pettis Perrv were given the job of working out a plan how we
could discredit Randolph, which the
Mr. ScHERER. Randolph was a Negro?
Mr. RosSER. Yes, a top Negro. So he was getting a medal that
the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People
give each year to some outstanding American Negro, white, or any
nationality in the field of human relations, and he was getting it
for his work of integration of Negroes into industry, and we found
out that a fellow traveler, Mrs. Charlotta Bass, was speaking the
night before he was speaking. Mrs. Bass' nephew, who was a writer
on the paper — she has a paper — had a paper, rather, the California
Eaffle — was a member of the Young Communist League.
We got together with him and convinced him to convince his aunt,
Mrs. Bass, who already was close to the Communists, but not that
close, to allow us to help with her speech, and she agreed, and we
wrote a speech that praised the Soviet Union, that called for the
opening of the second front, and that said Randolph was a traitor
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3119
to his country, that his threatened march on Washington was a march
that would bring about chaos and disunite our country at a time
when unity is needed, and she made that speech, and it created havoc.
But it gave the party not only the opportunity to discredit this Negro
leader, but it gave the party to opportunity to reach the top Negroes
in America with the program of the Communist Party at that time.
Mr. Velde. Mr. Rosser, at that time you were j)robably as high
as you ever were in the Communist Party.
Mr. RossER. That is right.
Mr. Velde. After Hitler marched on Soviet Russia do you have
within your knowledge any information concerning the attempt by
the high officials of the Communist Party here in the United States
to influence our lending aid to Soviet Russia or of contacting any
high officials in the State Department or any other departments of
our Government to influence our entry into the war ?
Mr. Rosser. Well, the whole program of the Communist Party —
and if we had the national resolution that
Mr. Scherer. I think it is important, and I don't think he is answer-
ino; your question. The question was, Do you have such information?
Mr. RossER. Yes, I will give it to you. On December 7, 1941 —
we have to go to that — at Pearl Harbor we all became friends, and
this gave the Communist Party the opportunity to carry out a pro-
gram among its members of all aid to the Soviet Union, and the type
of work that I did was through the unions. The unions carried on a
]3rogram of aid to the Soviet Union, all-out aid to the Soviet Union.
In the union that I worked for we passed resolutions of all-out aid
to the Soviet Union.
As far as working with the State Department, I had no connections
with that.
Mr. Velde. Wliile you didn't have any connections yourself, do. you
know of any officials of the Communist Party here who did contact
our own Federal officials at that time or State Department or other
department ?
Mr. RossER. No, I do not.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Rosser, did the Port Chicago accident that
occurred on the west coast have any effect upon your attitude toward
the Communist Party ?
Mr. RossER. You mean the explosion at Port Chicago ?
Mr. Tavenner. Yes.
Mr. RossER. Yes. At that time I had reached a point in my rela-
tionship with the Communist Party — I had asked for a leave of
absence from full-time w^ork, and the party had granted this leave
of absence, and I had gone to work as a longshoreman on the San
Pedro waterfront, and then I was called into the county office of
the Communist Party and told that because I had gone out of full-
time work that it created such a stir in the party, they wanted to know
why I had gotten out of full-time work, what was wrong with Rosser,
and there was a beef between me and some — what was it — so the
party decided that I should get out of California.
So they said the first step — and go east somewhere and work in
the party — the first step was San Francisco. I came to San Francisco,
and I brought my book and got a visitor's permit and worked on the
San Francisco waterfront in August of 1944. During that time,
3120 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
shortly after I came here, there was an explosion at Port Chica<2;o,
the ammunition dump, the place where the Navy loaded its ammuni-
tion, one of the places, and the following days the Negro sailors re-
fused to load any more ships because they were nervous because of
the explosion, the newspaper — this is what I got out of the news-
paper— said and that if they didn't load the ships, they were going
to be court martialed. So I went to the Communist Party head-
quarters. Louise Todd and Schneiderman was there and I said,
"Why don't we do something about this attempt to court martial
these Negi'o sailors?" I said, "Ever since I have been in the party
every time something happens to a Negro, the Communists say, 'Let's
do something.' " So Schneiderman looked out the window and said
to me, "Eosser, what is more important, loading those ships standing
in the harbor for the Soviet Union or those 50 men over there who
are going to jail?" And of course I walked out because he made
the party decision, loading the ships to the Soviet Union, and of
course all the Communists did about it was write a few articles in
the Daily People's World, and that was the thing that after putting
all my experiences with the party's attitude towards the Negro people,
coming from the days of the Scotsboro boys up to then, that I finally
made up my mind that if I could get out of the party, I was going
to get out. I went down to the waterfront, and a few days after
that the party gave me an assignment. The party caucus in the
longshore union told me that I would be asked for by the political
action committee to work in the election campaign.
Mr. Tavenner. Political action committee of what?
Mr. RossER. Of the CIO, to work in the election campaign, and
sure enough, I received a letter from the longshoremen here in Frisco,
saying that I had been appointed to the political action committee
in the Fillmore district, and I worked for a few weeks on the political
action committee, and then I went into a bar. I was disillusioned.
My wife and I had broken up. The Communists had used her
through those days to spy on me. I went into this bar, and I met a
Negro Communist who, during the days of the Maritime Federation,
was one of the top Communists on the Pacific coast in the trade-union
movement. Revels Cayton. Because of this disagreement with some
of the top Communist leaders in the trade-union movement who said
that he couldn't, when the CIO coimcil was formed in San Fran-
cisco, be a leader in the CIO council because the white workers would
not accept him, yet he had been the secretary of the Maritime Federa-
tion here on the coast in San Francisco, he told me I said, "Well, I
guess I will get on out of California and go on to Detroit somewhere
and just head around." He said, "You are a fool. I would quit the
party. I would go to Los Angeles where I got my base, and I would
just end it."
I said, "Don't you know that when you say that you were tired" —
I made a statement I was tired of being a stooge for Stalin — "that
when you made that statement to Harry Wood, you were all the
same as making it to Stalin ?"
So I took his advice and went back to Los Angeles and put in the
Negro paper that I, Louis Rasser, was no longer a member of the
Communist Party, and I quit.
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3121
But that wasn't the end. I received a letter from the State com-
mittee here in California saying that they had written me a letter to
Los Angeles, and I received a letter from Los Angeles asking me to
come in, saying that they thought that we could patch up the differ-
ences between me and the party. I went in, and in a meeting of Pettis
Perry, Paul Kline — these are the top leaders of the party — and Max
Silver
Mr. Tavenner. Max wdio?
Mr. EossER. Max Silver. They told me that I would either abide
by the decision of the Communist Party — they said :
Your quitting don't mean a thing, that ad in the paper. You can't quit the
Communist Party. You either get out of California and do what the party says,
or one day you will be a di-unken bum. In 0 months you will be a drunken bum
in the gutter.
And I told them that I was not going out of California, and they
stormed out of the room, and Max Silver told me, he said:
Look, you can't beat the party. If I were you, I would go home and in a
few days come in, and I will give you some money, and get on out of California.
I didn't take his advice. I went back to my mother and my home
and made amends with my mother. I hadn't seen my mother in 7
or 8 years. I had broken with them and my family, and I went back
to the church that I had been brought up in as a kid and I got
a job as a porter in a bowling alley, and the Communists brought
a delegation, some of them saw me there, and they brought a dele-
gation to this bowling alley, and the management came out and
told me, he is sorry, but a group of his patrons who had been
coming all the time said I was undesirable, I was a thief, and he had
to let me go ; he was sorry, and he gave me a recommendation saying
I was a very good man.
And then I got a job with the National Association for the Ad-
vancement of Colored People as a labor secretary. My job was to
see that Negroes were continuing to be hired, since the war was com-
ing to an end. The fellow travelers under the leadership of this
woman I mentioned, Mrs. Charlotta Bass, organized a campaign in
the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People
against me, and in order to get me fired they voted no funds for the
job I had, and they couldn't pay me. So then this church that I had
been around and was raised up in hired me in their welfare depart-
ment. They have a boys' home ; they have a free employment agency
that 20,000 or 30,000 people go through a year ; they have a commis-
sary to aid people; they have civil service classes teaching Negroes
how to prepare for civil service; they have a veterans' division, and
I finally became the head of that, and the top Negro fellow travelers
in southern California made periodic delegations to the pastor and
to the trustee board of this church trying to get him to fire me.
He wouldn't fire me, so then we gave a big festival, an interracial
choral festival, in the Hollywood Bowl. We hired a promoter, a
promoter by the name of Stiller.^ This Stiller was a Communist, and
he sabotaged this, and the party issued a thousand lettei-s about me
saying that I was irresponsible, and so forth, and that is my way out,
and that is what happened to me.
1 This individual further identified as George Stiller.
3122 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
Mr. Velde. At this point the committee will be in recess for 10
minutes.
(Whereupon, at 3 p. m., the hearing was recessed, to reconvene at
3:10 p.m.)
(The hearing reconvened at 3 :15 p. m.)
Mr. Velde. The committee will be in order. Proceed, Mr. Counsel.
Mr. Tavenner. You told the committee, Mr. Rosser, that in August
1944 you began work on the waterfront. Had you participated in
any union activities prior to that time?
Mr. EossER. Well, prior to that time for a couple of months, or 3
months, I was a member of the Newspaper Guild. I had an assign-
ment from the Communist Party to head the southern California
campaign to raise the quota, the Communist Party quota, for the
Daily People's World, and as an employee of the Daily People's World
I had to join the Newspaper Guild, and I met with the part of the
Communists, the Daily People's World group, that was a part of the
Newspaper Guild.
Also, when I was released by the county committee to go to work,
for a while I belonged to local 26 of the Warehousemen's Union in
Los Angeles.
Mr. Tavenner. Wliere was that ?
Mr. RossER. Los Angeles. That is the CIO. Then I went into
local 13 of the Longshoremen's Union, CIO.
Mr. Tavenner. Where was that ?
Mr. RossER. San Pedro; and then I worked on a visitor's permit
from San Pedro on the San Francisco waterfront under the jurisdic-
tion of local 10 of the International Longshoremen's and Warehouse-
men's Union, and in all these groups I belonged to the Communist
Party fraction or group within these organizations.
Mr. Tavenner. When were you a member of local 10, ILWU, in
San Francisco?
Mr. RossER. Oh, I will say from August 1944 up to January 1945.
Mr. Tavenner. What connection, if any, did you have with Com-
munists in industry which was not related to your own union activities ?
Mr. Rosser. Well, when I was the financial drive director of the
Daily People's World in southern California, I met with all types of
party groups and fractions within the different unions, in the Furniture
Workers' Union, Warehousemen's Union, Longshoremen's Union, a
group in the Fishermen's Union, the Utility Workers' Union; wher-
ever the Communists had a group, I met with them, and when I was
up here in San Francisco, besides being with the Communist Party
fraction, I also was on the Political Action Committee and met with
Hendricks ^ of the longshoremen, Dave Hedley — he was head of the
political action there of Communists
Mr. Tavenner. How do you spell the name?
Mr. RossER. H-e-d-1-e-y, Hedley; Posner, P-o-s-n-e-r — his name —
Posey, P-o-s-e-y — I have forgotten his first name ^ — Communist Party
member who was a member of the Warehousemen's Union and who
1 Followins the testimony of Lou Rosser, this Individual, whose full name is Frank
Hendricks, requested to be heard, and wished to deny under oath that he had ever been
a Communist Party member. At this time, the San Francisco hearings had been adjourned,
but it was explained to Hendricks by a staff member that Rosser had stated that he, Rosser,
had met with Hendricks, not as a 'Communist Party member, but to discuss the Political
Action Committee.
^ This individual further identified as Max Posey.
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES EST THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3123
was assigned by the Political Action Committee, Dave Hedley, to head
the drive in the Fillmore district. That is where at that time the
majority of Negroes and Japanese and minorities lived here in Frisco;
also, had a meeting with Dick Lynden.
Mr. Ta\"enner. Wliat is the name?
Mr. RossER. Dick, Richard, Lynden ; Richard Lynden is one of the
officials of Local 6 of the Warehousemen's Union, either the president
or the secretary-treasurer, I have forgotten.
Mr. Tavennee. Now are you speaking of Communist Party
members ?
Mr. RossER. Yes, Dick Lynden is a member — I knew him when he
was a member of the Young Communist League. I worked with Dick
Lynden on the State committee of the Young Communist League, and
then I knew him as a Communist, as I said, when he became an official
in Local 6 of the Warehousemen's Union here in the city. Dick Lyn-
den was very active. He came from San Jose, and then he moved
up here to Frisco, and through the party's manipulations he soon
became the leader of this big union here in San Francisco. In my
work also down in southern California I met an auto worker from
up here over across the Bay. His name is Jack Montgomery ; he was
brought down and made the head of the Auto Workers' International
down in southern California, I guess maybe for the State, and as the
organizer of the 14th Congressional District I had a conference with
Jack Montgomery on the question of the upgrading of Negroes in the
unions and the policy of the Communist Party. This was after the
Hitler pact.
Mr. Tavenner. Then your experience with him related to a Com-
munist Party activity ?
Mr. Rosser. That is right.
Mr. Tavexxer. Was he known to you to be a member of the Com-
munist Party ?
Mr. RossER. Oh, yes. And I met a person that I worked with in
the Warehousemen's Union by the name of Duarte, who came down
to LA.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you spell the name, please ?
Mr. Rosser. I think it is D-u-a-r-t-e. I worked with him ; I know
him as a member of the Communist Party. I have been in meetings
with him.
Mr. Ta\"enner. Do you know his first name ?
Mr. RossER. I have forgotten his first name.
Mr. Tavenner. Can you identify him more specifically ?
Mr. RossER. Well, he was an organizer when I met him for the
International Warehousemen's Union, and he later became one of the
top leaders of the Warehousemen's Union. I don't know what he is
doing now.
Mr. Tavenner. Do you know what nickname he was known by ?
Mr. RossER. I think it was "Chili," I think. I don't know ; I have
forgotten.
Mr. Tavenner. Wliat was the date on which you became acquainted
with him and knew him to be a member of the Communist Party?
Mr. Rosser. It was in 1943 ; 1943 and then in 1944.
Mr. Tavenner. Do you know where he resided ?
Mr. Rosser. I don't know whether he resided in Frisco or in
Oakland.
3124 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
Mr. Ta\'ennek. Can you give any further identifying information
regarding him ?
Mr. KossER. Well, I was introduced to him by one of the wheel-
horses of the Communist Party in the Warehousemen's Union named
Dawson, D-a-w-s-o-n — I can't think of his first name, but he was one
of the beginners of the Commvmist fraction in the Warehousemen's
Union, and he is the one that introduced me to him.
Mr. Tavenner. I want to go back a moment to the period when you
were representing the People's World in the campaign to obtain
money from the various unions where you had Communist Party
groups organized. Were you successful in obtaining contributions
to the People's World from those organizations ?
Mr. KossER. Well, each party group in each organization like the
furniture workers and the utility workers raised their quota. Some
of the unions gave money directly out of their treasuries, and some of
the Communists — the unions set up People's World committees right
in the unions, and these committees' jobs were to raise money any
way they could to make up the quota that was assessed the Commu-
nist groups in those unions.
Mr. Tavenner. 1 would like you to tell the committee how the
Communist Party sought to exercise influence or control upon a
union through its Communist Party members, if you know, giving
instances, and if you can identify the names of persons involved, give
them.
Mr. RossER. Well, one instance is that of freedom of Earl Brow-
der in, I think, 1943. In a meeting that I was in with Charlie Pfeifer —
this is in Los Angeles — and Al Kaplan, Bert Corona, Lou Sherman —
who is the brother of William Schneiderman — Lloyd Seliger, Her-
schel Alexander, we discussed how we were going to push the cam-
paign in that union to get the individual members and the union to
go on record to send telegrams and postcards to the President and
to the Congressmen from southern California to free Earl Browder.
Mr. Tavenner. What union was that ?
Mr. Rosser. The Warehousemen's Union. And the ways and means
we would use would be to get this union to introduce a resolution in
the CIO council. This was discussed thoroughly in the Communist
Party group in this union, and then the night of the meeting, at the
meeting we had it planned out. Each Communist Party member
raised the question of freedom of Earl Browder and took the floor
and explained and continued to explain until we made a motion, and
through our efforts and our tactics, we were able to push through a
motion where the union went on record to free Earl Browder.
Mr. Tavenner. Were all of these individuals with whom you met
members of the union as well as being members of the Communist
Party?
Mr. Rosser. You mean the first meeting I had ?
Mr. Tavenner. Yes.
Mr. Rosser. They were all members of the union and members of
the Communist Party. The only nonmember of the union was Matt
Pelman, the labor secretary of the Communist Party, who met with us.
(Representative Gordon H. Scherer left the hearing room at this
point.)
Mr. TA\Ti:NNER. So you had functionaries of the Communist Party
meeting in secret session with officials of the union in an effort to
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES EST THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3125
obtain passage by the union, in a meeting subsequently to be held, of
the Communist Party resolution ?
Mr. EossER. That is right.
Mr. Tavenner. Was that the accustomed procedure in endeavoring
to obtain action along Communist Party lines ?
Mr. RossER. Well, that is the practice of the Communist Party not
only in the unions, but in every organization. The Communist Party
in some organizations has more members than others. In other or-
ganizations they might have 300 members, a big organization, so in
that organization they have what you call a Communist club, and then
they had the officials of the union in a top type of a fraction. The
officials meet, and their decision is brought down, and they are dis-
cussed in the club, and when it is brought on the floor, all the Com-
munists are acquainted, and they fight it.
In a YJNICA or Y WCA club the same thing happened. In the
Young Democrats, for example, when Hitler made the pact with
Stalin, and we had to go against the grain in a meeting of Jim Bur-
ford, Joe Ayeroff, Keivetz.^
Mr. Tavexner. How do you spell it?
Mr. RossER. K-e-i-v-e-t-z, that is all I know. Claudia Williams
from San Francisco — all these are Communists. We discussed ways
and means to fight through the Young Democrats, the State and the
counties, the wliole question of the Hitler pact and why the Young
Democrats should oppose the war. In the Negro organizations, the
National Negro Congress, the National Association for the Advance-
ment of Colored People, for example, the fraction meets the same way.
If they have anybody on the executive board, they meet with the rank
and file members, they discuss the party's program and the policy, and
then they go back, and they carry through the units. In this way the
party is able not only to push through the program of the party, but
the party discusses the elections that come up in these organizations,
and especially in the unions. In one of the unions I was in when
election came up, we discussed it in the fraction, the longshore union —
this is down in L. A. Coyne Young, Lyle Proctor, Baker - — that is his
last name — Dean Hood, Preston Hill, myself, Utrich ^ — I don't know
his first name— and Polkki ^ — this is a party fraction in the long-
shoremen down in Pedro, and we discussed the election campaign and
who we felt should be the Communists who should run, and the other
people whom we would support, the non- Communists.
_ After we discussed it further, then we built what we called a progres-
sive caucus of those people who w^re interested in the people that we
had picked, and througli this progi-essive caucus the party was able to
spread its campaign, and before the election we put out the progressive
slate, and the majority of the people that we supported, the Com-
munists, were elected. Tliis is why the party raised the slogan of
working, building groups in the decisive organizations and in the
mass organizations of the people.
In this way they gained control of these organizations, and once in
control, then they pushed— of course there came a time when the work-
1 This individual further idontified as Julet; Keivetz.
- This individual further identified as Donald Baker.
3 Further identified as Harrv Utrich
■* Further Identified as John'Polkki.
3126 COIVIMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
ers — there were two org^anizations ; the Communists have an organiza-
tion within their organization.
(Representative Gordon H. Scherer returned to the hearing room
at this point.)
Mr. RossER. And then the party reached the decision to abolish in
a way fractions, and they set up what they call industrial units, and
these industrial units had two purposes. In the fraction the men
would come to a fraction and discuss the union policy and go home,
but in the industrial unit they not only could discuss policy as the
union, but the party had a chance to get them together every week
and train them in the teachings of Marx, Lenin, and Stalin ; and the
industrial units have proven best because in training these people in
the teachings of Lenin and Stalin, it is not necessary to have the type
of fraction they had in the old days because all these people under-
stand how — most of them — to apply Leninism to the situation and
what must be done.
Mr. Ta\t:nnek. Will you tell us the meaning of a Communist
fraction ?
Mr. RossER. The meaning of Communist fraction is 1, 2, 3, and 4
people or a group or more people who belong to the same organization
or work in the same industry.
Mr. Tavenner. But who are members of the Communist Party?
Mr. RossER. They are members of the Communist Party.
Mr. Tavenner. Were the members of these Communist fractions
which you have described secret members of the Communist Party as
far as the rank and file membersliip of the unions or other organiza-
tions were concerned ?
Mr. RossER. Three-fourths of them were secret members. The party
in almost every organization, unless they consider it really reaction-
ary, the majority of the Communist Party members are underground.
But they always have 1 or 2 well-liked Communists who are the face
of the party who stand up on the floor as Communists and carry the
party line, and they are usually the party whip in the union meetings
and in meetings of the organization.
But in an organization like the Young Democrats or Young Repub-
licans there are no open Comumnists ; they are all Young Democrats,
but they have secret meetings at the party.
Mr. Jackson. Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Velde. Mr. Jackson,
Mr. Jackson. In the union of which you were speaking in which
this group of Communists operated, what was the total membership ;
do you know?
Mr. RossER. No ; I do not.
Mr. Jackson. In round figures?
Mr. RossER. I do not.
Mr. Jackson. What was the Communist membership?
Mr. RossER. Well, in the Warehousemen's Union down in Los
Angeles the membership in the union was a pretty big union, but the
membership was only about 15, and only about 10 attended the meetings
regularly. In the Longshoremen's Union the membership was about
22.
Mr. Jackson. But through organization and prior deliberations it
was possible to guide the policies in large part ?
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3127
INIr. RossER. Oh, it doesn't tcake numbers. That is why the Com-
munist Party one year might liave 50,000, and the next year they
might only have 25,000, but they are just as effective. It is a question
of applying the Communist Party line in day-to-day work, the correct
approach of winning over the people, because the Communists will
direct the revolution, they won't be on the barricades. But they will
see that the people fight on the barricades, and they will direct it. It
is not numbers.
Mr. Doyle. Mr. Chairman, may I ask this question there? Do I
understand the significance of your last statement, which was that
these Communist leaders would "direct the revolution" — wasn't that
your statement?
Mr. RossER. That is right, direct it and lead it, give it guidance
through their understanding of Marxism and Leninism, but if you
read the history of the Russian revolution, it is the Russian people.
Mr. Doyle. Now, may I ask you this question : Is it a fact that they
really believe that there will be a forceful revolution to overthrow
our form of government ? Is tliat one reason that some people enter
the Communist Party, in order to have that opportunity at a later
date in their judgment ?
Mr. RossER. People enter the Communist Party for many reasons.
Most Negroes enter the Communist Party because they see that phase
of the Communist Party that is always yelling about Negro rights,
wanting to picket for Negro rights and fight for Negro rights.
Trade unionists join the Communist Party because they see them on
the ships and on the docks and in the factories hollering. First they
holler about cleaning up the lavatories, our safety rules, $1.50 more an
hour, or shortening the working day. They don't realize that the Com-
munists have another motive behind this, that Lenin taught the Com-
munists that you have to use the immediate demands of the working
class in order to gain control of them, so the party uses these in order
to weave their way into the confidence of the people and to gain control
of their organization, and in that way, to lead them on to the
revolution.
Some people join the Communist Party because they are seeking a
Utopia. Others are frustrated for a way out. But I would say this,
tliat leadership of the Communist Party in America is not a frustrated
leadership. It is a well educated, well hardened, tried leadership, in
strike, struggle, street battles. Some have been trained in Moscow;
some have worked over in China ; some have worked throughout the
world; some have led demonstrations of a hundred thousand people
on hunger marches, big unemployed demonstrations; some have led
general strikes. They have done all types of organization. So when
people think that they are dealing with a frustrated bunch of men
and women, they are wrong. They are dealing with a group of men
and women who have pledged themselves to build a Soviet America.
Mr. Doyle. AVliat was the object of the secrecy of the Communist
Party in its operations within the field of industry and labor and other
organizations ?
Mr. RossER. Well, in the beginning when the Communist Party
started infiltrating in the 1920's and the 1930's, it was organized in
America and began to infiltrate into the unions and into industry. The
leadership of the A. F. of L. was reactionary, and they didn't do too
3128 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
much to help the workers, and the Communists were using the legiti-
mate demands of the workers. Wlien they would come out openly
as Communists, they were blacklisted, and they were fired. So in
order to carry on the work of the Communist Party and to stay on the
job and in the unions, the Communist Party strategy which they
learned from Lenin was to legally and illegally work, and this is a part
of the illegal work of being underground, not to be known as
Communists.
]Mr. Doyle. Many instances have come to the attention of this com-
mittee during its investigations where organizations, upon learning^
the true nature of the Communist Party membership of its leaders,
have immediately outvoted them and succeeded in evading their con-
trol and influence, whereas if they had been known or open members,
that would have been accomplished with a great deal of ease, but
where kept secret it was impossible to fight.
Mr. KossER. Wei], that is true. It is according, though, to the
period that the Communist Party is in. In 1936, 1937, 1938, up to the
Hitler pact, especially 1937 and 1938, the Communist Party had many
open meetings. Communists in the labor groups, and Communists in
neighborhood groups would put out leaflets in the neighborhood about
Communist Party open meetings, inviting anybody to come in and
bring their members. But once they started in the Hitler pact, the
Communist Party closed. There were no more open meetings; the
Communist Party immediately set up the apparatus to go under-
ground, divided their clubs into small groups and moved in the di-
rection of secrecy again in the underground. I will say this: Even
in the days when they had the open meetings, there were thousands of
Communists who were not open, who were hidden and closed Com-
munists. I don't want to call his name, and I hope the committee
doesn't ask me, but I will give you an example.
I worked with a young Mexican back in 1935 or 1936, in the Young^
Communist League. He was a student, and all of a sudden he joined
the Communist Party, too, and the Communist Party started to de-
velop him. Then all of a sudden he just disappeared, and he didn't
come around the Young Communist League or the Communist Party
any more, and a friend of his also disappeared, and they just became
crazy about hunting, just had to go to Mexico every 2 or 3 weeks to
hunt, and of course this person, was a courier for the party between
the party here in California — lower California and the party in
northern California. That is the way they do.
This person was put right down in the underground. He went back
and forth. This party today is not known, and he has a very respon-
sible position in Los Angeles. The party has all types of people like
that hidden in the underground.
Mr. Jackson. You say that this person to the best of your knowl-
edge is still a member of the Communist Party.?
Mr. RossER. To the best of my knowledge.
Mr. Ta%t.nner. Mr. Eosser, I do not want to go into detail on tlie
1934 strike, but I would be content with asking you to what extent
the Communist Party was involved in that strike.
Mr. Rosser. Well, the only thing that I can say about that strike
is what I did and my work down in southern California. In southern
California the party was so afraid that the Negi'oes would scab be-
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3129
cause the union had barred Negroes from jobs on the dock, and when
the strike broke out, the depression was on, and a lot of Negroes wanted
jobs, so I, along with another Negro, was assigned to build a com-
mittee of prominent Negroes, ministers especially, whose job was to
educate the Negroes and convince them that they must support the
strike and not scab.
Then when the strike was won by the union and over, we would be
able to get jobs. I met in a meeting that I was in, after the strike,
and evaluation of the strike was given to the top Communist leaders
in Los Angeles, and some of the top Communist leaders in the union,
Tom Brown, longshoreman, leader of the union; Coyne Young,
Polkki
Mr. Tavenner. Are you identifying those individuals also as Com-
munist Party members i
Mr. RossER. Yes, Communist Party members, and they were long-
shoremen— Dean Hood; and the party functionaries were Lou Bar-
on, myself, Pettis Perry, Betty Gannett, State committee of the Com-
munist Party, and the other 2 or 3 I can't remember, but at that
meeting a person, Harry Jackson, who was the international organizer
of the Marine Workers Industrial Union here on the coast on the
national committee of the party, analyzed the 1934 strike, and he
pointed out to us that the maritime strike on the Pacific coast and the
great general strike in San Francisco proved that the Communists
in California carried out correctly the decisions of the open letter of
the national committee of the Communist Party in 1933, and the fact
that they concentrated in the basic industries in southern and northern
California — that was marine, longshore, and so forth — and in doing
that they were able to build in the A. F. of L. unions, the longshoremen,
the Marine Cooks and Stewards, and those other unions, the revolu-
tionary blocs, groups of Communists who were able and who had
enough influence over the men because they were fighting for the
things that the longshoremen and the men wanted; that they w^ere
able to lead the men into the struggle and into the path that the
Communist program pointed the way, and that was the path of build-
ing and training them for the revolution, leading them against the war.
He said that the general strike and the maritime strike taught the
M'orkers how to hate capitalism and that the Army and guards were
the tools of the capitalist class, and it gave the party an opportunity
to show how, with a correct program of orientation of working in
these unions, that the party would finally be able to lead the workers
on the path and to a revolution in -.this country.
Mr. Tavenner. Can you identify other members of the Communist
Party who took part in fraction meetings which you attended in the
area of San Francisco or persons that you otherwise knew to be mem-
bers of the Communist Party ?
Mr. RossER. Well, there are a few more I worked with in San
Francisco. In the Young Communist League on the State committee
I worked with Lloyd Lehman. Lloyd Lehman was a member of the
Young Communist League, member of the Communist Party.
Mr. Tavenner. The first name is Lloyd ?
Mr. RossEE. L-o-y-d, L-e-h-m-a-n. I worked witli and I named
Dick Lynden. I worked with Helen Wheeler in the building of the
41002 — 54 — pt. 1 6
3130 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
California Youth Legislature. She was in the Yonnj]^ Communist
League. I worked with her. I know Paul Heide of the Warehouse-
men's Union as a Communist.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you spell the last name ?
Mr. RossER, H-e-i-d-e.
Mr. Tavenner. H-e-i-d-e ?
Mr. Rosser. Yes, Heide.
Mr, Velde. At what period of time did you know him as a Com-
munist?
Mr. Rosser. I knew him back in 1942.
Mr. Velde. And how did you know that he was a member of the
Communist Party ?
Mr. Rosser. I met him in a State meeting up here at the Communist
Party.
Mr. Velde. Was that a closed meeting?
Mr. Rosser. Yes.
Mr. ScHERER. Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Velde. Mr. Scherer.
Mr. Scherer. Was this man in the union at the time you left the
party ?
Mr. Rosser. Yes, I am sure he was, in the Warehousemen's Union.
Mr. Scherer. Is he still in the union today?
Mr. Rosser. I really don't know whether he is or not. I knew Archie
Brown. I worked with Archie Brown in the Young Communist
League. Archie Brown was a very active Communist, and he was a
member of the Longshoremen's Union.
I knew Harry Williams, a Negro Communist in the Young Com-
munist League, who is active in the bay area, a member of the Com-
munist Party.
Mr. Tavenner. I think I should ask you if you know whether or not
any of these persons have severed their connections with the Com-
munist Party, you should say so.
Mr. Rosser. I do not. I think that those are about all I can remem-
ber in the bay area. Earlier in the day I mentioned quite a few that
I knew. Revels Cayton and Hugh Bryson, Jack Olsen; those people
that I knew up here in the bay area.
Mr. Tavenner. Were you acquainted with Kenneth Austin?
Mr. Rosser. I don't remember at the time.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Chairman, I think that is all I desire to ask.
Mr. Velde. Mr. Jackson, do you have any questions?
Mr. Jackson. Yes, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Rosser, in your opinion, and growing out of your experience in
the Communist Party, do you feel that the operations of the con-
spiracy would be hampered, or would they be benefited, by the passage
of legislation outlawing the Communist Party ?
Mr. Rosser. Well, I think that knowing the Communists, I think
outlawing the Communist Party would only make them screen their
membership more and go farther into the underground and use dif-
ferent approaches that we would hardly be able to find them. For
awhile they would be quiet, unless something happened to the Soviet
Union, and their work during those days would be educating their
members and building the party and building themselves into the
legal organizations of the people and becoming elected to offices, tak-
ing the teachings of Lenin and doing a lot of things.
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3131
I think that the outlawing of the party at this period would be a
mistake. I think what has to be done, we have to understand what the
Communists are doing, is to fight with the minds of the people of the
world, and I think the American Government has to develop a pro-
gram where the American people understand the whole meaning of
communism so that we don't have to go to this to acquaint them with
the program of the party, because after all, the Communist theory is
not just something you can just knock aside. It is up here in their
minds.
Mr. Jackson. Do you have any recommendation relative to
legislative action by the Congress which in your opinion is necessary
to meet the threat of communism ?
Mr. RossER. Well, I haven't given that a thought at this time.
I think one thing; there are a lot of ex-Communists who know quite
a bit about the Communist movement, a lot more than I ever would
know, who have had quite a bit of experience in the whole deal of the
Communist movement, but I think that because the American public
has not been educated to understand them and to accept them back —
only a few — and because of the threat of the Communists of smear-
ing them and the threat that they won't be able to get a job, they
have kept quiet, and I think one of the things — because the people
who understand the Communists the most are the ex-Communists,
and in America there are hundreds running around who have worked
in every department of the Communists, in the espionage, in the
underground, with the Russian police in this country, with the whole
deal.
Mr. Jackson". "WTien witnesses such as yourself, whose testimony has
been clear, comprehensive, and lucid, see fit to come forward to give
this committee, the Congress, and the people of the United States the
benefit of such a valuable addition to the sum total of the knowledge
possessed by them relative to the Communist conspiracy, the com-
mittee has done everything within its power to be helpful to those
witnesses and to make their social and political rehabilitation possible.
I can say as one member of the committee that I am most apprecia-
tive of your testimony ; certainly the testimony relating to your own
people and the role they have played in the overall Communist scheme
of attack is well worth the time of the committee if nothing else had
come out, and much else of value has been developed.
For my part, 1 want to extend to you my personal thanks, IVIr.
Eosser, for your appearance and your testimony.
Mr. Velde. Mr. Scherer.
Mr. Scherer. Mr. Rosser, I wouldn't ask you the following ques-
tions except that you, yourself, voluntarily touched upon it in your
testimony. You said at one point that the Communists had your wife
spying and informing on you. Did I understand you correctly ?
Mr. RossER. That is right.
Mr. Scherer. I assume then that she was an ardent member of
the party also?
Mr. RossER. Well, she was a new member, but she was full of that
zeal and fire, and the Communists, what they did — I didn't agree —
they pushed her quickly into leadership in the front organizations, and
then Pettis Perry visited my house all the time, and he had a study
group with my wife and a couple of other people, and during that
3132 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
period that I was kind of lax and trying to figure how I was going
to get out of the party, he would always ask her, what is the matter
with me, and so once I had a visit from a person — I don't know
whether the Communists sent him, the FBI, or what, but he came
and he said that he, a white person, heard that I knew a lot of
Negroes who were sympathetic to the Japanese, and my wife was
sitting there in my discussion with him, and my mother-in-law, and
I saicl, "Yes, I know a lot of Negroes and Japanese, when they went
to the inteinment camp, gave tliem hotels, automobiles, houses, and
furniture," and I said, "The majority of Negi'oes feel that it was wrong
to put the Japanese in the camp because the majority didn't under-
stand that the Japanese fishing fleets were used by the Japanese as
spies on the American Government," and so when I was in a meeting
with the top leaders of the Communist Party, when they made a
decision for me to get out of town, they said that "your wife said" —
Mary Lou was her name — "that you had meetings with the FBI and
that you discussed with the FBI the Ja]3anese question of the Negroes
who were sympathetic to the Japanese," and then they said she also
told them the time that there was a Negro American named Harry
Haywood. He was trained in Moscow in the Lenin school. He is
the person who wrote the Communist position on the Negro question.
He was at my house one night when I was just tired of the Com-
munist movement, and so he asked me what was wrong with me. I
was getting out, I was getting out of full-time work. And I told him —
I was kidding — I said, "Well" — just threw it off — I said, "I am just
tired of being a stooge for Stalin," and so he took it to the State com-
mittee and everywhere. My wife took it, and they used her in that
way ; everything that I did from the time I asked to be released from:
full-time work, she told the Communists.
Mr. ScHERER. You actually know that she informed
Mr. RossER. They told me.
Mr. ScHERER. In addition to their telling you that ?
Mr. RossER. Yes.
Mr. ScHERER. Were the circumstances such that you know she did
that?
Mr, RossER. Yes, and of course, if we want to develop about her,
she moved to San Francisco later on, and she is in the Warehousemen's
Union, and I hear she tried to — maybe a couple of years ago — tried to
run for business agent. While up for business agent of the Ware-
housemen's Union, the party told her that she wasn't prepared — of
course, they didn't want a Negro woman as a business agent — she
wasn't prepared ; she couldn't hold the job ; she didn't have the leader-
ship ability. This is what I heard from one of my friends in the
Warehousemen's Union, and they pulled the pegs out from under her
and wrecked the campaign she had built up to be a business agent of
the Warehousemen's Union and she got sore, and now I don't know
whether she is still in the party or not, but the thing she did to me,
they turned around and did to her.
Well, that is nothing new. The Communist Party used
Mr. ScHERER. Well, we have heard testimony similar, of course,
before, but I just wanted to pinpoint the testimony because you sort
of glossed over it.
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3133
Mr. RossER. On the question of the Communist Party making their
members informers, during the war when the Communist Party was
fighting to save the Soviet Union and we were fighting for the second
front, the Communist Party had members in southern California who
regularly went to the FBI and told the FBI of those people in the
shipyards who made statements about, oh, "This is not my war" — you
know, a lot of people said we shouldn't be in this war — any kind of
person they wanted to get rid of, they regularly went to the FBI — this
is a matter of record — and informed on those people. It is not only in
the party, but anything. The party used anybody and informs on
them to the advantage of advancing the party program.
Mr. ScHERER. I have no further questions.
Mr. Velde. Mr. Doyle.
Mr. Doyle. Mr. Rosser, you are here in this hearing room without
any attorney, without any lawyer's advice. Of course under rule 7
of our committee you knew you w^ere entitled to have a lawyer with
you. Why didn't you bring one ?
Mr. Eosser. Well, when I quit the Communist Party, I tried to stay
quiet, and they pestered me so, and the church I belonged to, the
minister of this church finally got tired of it. We were discussing the
Korean war and the meaning of it, and he told me, "Why don't you
just go to the Government and tell them everything and tell them that
you are willing to cooperate w^ith them and get these Communists off
of your neck," and I finally agreed.
In 1951, I think, I went to the FBI, talked it over, and I didn't see
them again until 1952 when they asked me to appear in the Smith
trials. The reason I didn't bring an attorney is because I have men-
tally conditioned myself and made my mind up that I want to be a
loyal citizen of America. I am an American, and I think — you can
let the Negroes laugh because I think they should liear this — that the
■Communist threat in America and the way that the Communists now
are using it — in Los Angeles the head of the Communist Party is a
Negro. In the national office Pettis Perry, a Negro, is head of the
Communist Party ; all over America they are putting Negroes in the
front fight of the Communist Party to try to show the American
whites that these Negroes are the Communists and hiding the white
workers in the underground, and in this way to stir up race antago-
nism and to try to use us in this thing. I for one feel and know that
all the gains that the Negi'o people have made in advancing themselves
to full citizenship in America were not due to the Communist Party.
It was due to the Negro leader^ themselves and the honest white
people in America who want to see America give a square deal to all,
and the Communist Party only used the Negroes as a pawn to pursue
their own political ends.
When it was good, they would use them, Wlien it was no good,
they would not use them.
As an example, in the Longshoremen's Union that was controlled by
the Communists in San Pedro for years, they would not let a Negro
work in that union on the docks.
(Representative Donald L. Jackson left the hearing room at this
point. )
Mr. RossER. And even in the war when they needed men and had
to put them on the docks, the Communists among themselves made an
3134 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
agreement that, well, they didn't want to lose this union because the
majority of white longshoremen, they said, were opposed to Negroes,
so they would only give them permit cards so when the war was over,
they could kick them out. And when we Communists, longshoremen,
got up and made a fight and forced them to give the Negroes books in
the Longshoremen's Union down in San Pedro, the Communist Party
leadership in Los Angeles called me and other Negro Communists in,
and there were 3 of us, and they kicked the others out. I was the only
one who was not kicked out because we broke a party decision. I am
tiere because I want to do everything that I can and explain to the
Negro people and the American people the threat of the Communist
conspiracy ; that it is not a political organization, it is not an American
organization, but is a part of a worldwide organization of Commu-
nists whose major aim is to, through coercion, through organization,
through strikes, through capturing our organizations, through using
one group against the other, through bringing about confusion in or-
der to prepare an armed uprising and civil war and overthrow of this
Government and establishing in its place the dictatorship of the So-
viet Union, a Soviet Government. As we look back at what happened
to the Jewish people once the Communists got in power in Russia and
put them all out on that desert in Birobidjan, we can see — and they al-
ready plan for the Negro's statehood. They would give us the worn-
out land down there somewhere in Alabama, and I am ready to fight
against that thing, and it took me a long time to reach this, and I did
a lot of damage to this country while in the Conununist Party.
I was a very good organizer; I was a Negro fraternity leader; I
could go in any Negro church and speak ; I was welcomed by all the
Negroes, and today I must say that I am still, since I quit the party.
I am happy to say that the Negro community in Los Angeles has
opened their arms to me, and I am a part of the Negro community,
and I am not one of those violent anti-Communists who holler "Com-
munist." I am one of those constructive kind who try to educate the
Negroes to understand, and that is why I quit, and that is why I have
no attorney. I don't need an attorney.
Mr. DoTLE. Now, Mr. Rosser, I certainly wish to compliment you
on your magnificently helpful statement, but you have mentioned
many times the Young Communist League, and immediately I want
to know how young and how old those young people are in the Young
Communist League.
Mr. RossER. I was, I think, 25 or 26, and the leadership of the — you
have to understand the Young Communist League. They got them
in from 14 to 27, 28, 29, but the Young Communist League is a train-
ing ground for Communists, and the leadership of the Young Com-
munist League — there they put these young people, 20, 25, 26, whom
they want to train. For example, I worked with Gil Green, the na-
tional chairman of the Young Communist League, who is now one
of the top Communists in America.
I worked with Bob Thompson on the national committee of the
Communist Party in America. I worked with Henry Winston, a
Negro Young Communist League member who was trained in the
Young Communist League who is a national leader of the Communist
Party in America.
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3135
I worked with Johnnie Gates. Johnnie Gates was in the Young
Communist League, was trained there. He is a national leader of
the Young Communist League.
In California I worked with Ben Dobbs. Ben Dobbs is State leader
of the Young Communist League. I worked with Celeste Strack in
the student movement. She was trained in the Young Communist
League. She is a State leader of the Young Communist League, and
in the party, anybody who is a leader, a State leader or county leader,
of the Young Communist League is also a member of the Communist
Party.
Mr. DoTLE. Now, Mr. Rosser, may I ask you this : What was your
experience, if any — because I haven't discussed this or any other
questions or testimony with you — in the Communist Party with refer-
ences to what pattern, if any, should be followed by Communist Party
members in being subpenaed before this committee? Were they to
claim the fifth amendment? Were they to claim their constitutional
rights generally? Or what was their instruction, if any, from the
Communist Party headquarters?
(Representative Donald L. Jackson returned to the hearing room
at this point.)
Mr. RossER. I have only had one experience, my own personal ex-
perience. I was called before the grand jury in 1936 or 1937 in the
Webster case. I don't know whether it is 1936 or 1937 right now.
Pettis Perry — quite a few of the leading Communists of southern
California were called before the grand jury, and in a meeting with
the county leadership of the Communist Party I was told the only
answers I could give were my name, my address, where I lived, who
my family was, if I wanted to, but any discussion about the Com-
munist Party, that was out; because I was an open, known Com-
munist, I would say yes, I was a member of the Communist Party.
The party members, they are told what to do in training.
Mr. Doyle. You mentioned in your testimony twice that the Com-
munist Party even tried to work through the Young Democrats and
the Young Republicans. I notice you mentioned that twice. In
what way did the Communist Party try to work through the Young
Democrats and the Young Republicans in California?
Mr. RossER. Wei], the party has a program and in the Young Dem-
ocrats, the question of building a Communist group in there, some
of them were elected into the State leadership of the Young Demo-
crats. The Young Republicans, the party program was a little dif-
ferent. There is a program of confusion, a program stating that the
Republicans didn't have a program, blah, blah, blah, blah, and the
Young Democrats, for California especially — the party used the
Young Democrats as a whip to push the party program for the things
that the party wanted and to use them as a place where they could
attract a lot of people who later on got patronage jobs in the Govern-
ment, and so forth.
Mr. DoYLE. May I ask you this question: "VMiat, if any, to your
personal knowledge is the attitude of the Communist Party toward
the functioning of this particular committee — we will say the Un-
American Activities Committee of the House of Representatives?
What position, if any, has the Communist Party taken during your
membership in it toward the function of this committee?
3136 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
Mr. EossER. Well, I think the best answer I could give for you,
Congressman Doyle, is the Friday issue of the Daily People's World.
I think that gives the answer a lot better. Of course they mention
the committee, but they jump on Mr. Velde, and I think that would
give the answer of the party because you have to understand the
Daily People's World is not just a newspaper. It is a directive to
every Communist Party member who understands Marx and Lenin.
It is a directive. When they discuss the Un-American Activities
Committee and say it is bogus and baloney and no good and this and
that, it means every Communist, wlierever he is, nuist start a protest
against the Un-American Activities Committee, and be it the union
or Eepublican club or Democratic club or social club or PTA, after
they read the Daily People's World issue on that, they know.
They have an issue in there on the Negro Wells, to free him out of
jail. Every Communist who will read that will know that the job
in the shop is to get one of those ])etitions to get him free. So the
party's attitude on these committees — you can understand that — is
that they must be abolished because they are going after the Commu-
nist Party.
Mr. Doyle. You did not mention anywhere in your dissertation
the Duclos letter, and I am wondering if you have any opinion to give
on that, or are you in a position to
Mr, EossER. Well, the Duclos letter, I pointed out that at Pearl
Harbor, when the party was figliting hard for the opening of the
second front in Teheran, when Churchill and Stalin and Eoosevelt
met, and they agreed in December 1943 to open the second front
through Europe and to give more aid to the Soviet Union and food
and material, the party, in order to not disrupt this decision, took
Lenin's teachings and used them. So the party retreated; the party
came out through the party press and said that in this period and the
postwar period, after there is no need for the Communist Party — and
they discussed the two-party system, and they said they were going
to dissolve the Communist Party and set up the Communist Political
Association, and in this w\ay the national leadership of the party felt
that they would ease the tension of the American people because the
American people felt that even though they were helping Eussia,
every time the Eed army moved, they had a bayonet, and they had
propaganda, so they wanted to ease the tension, that the Communist
Party is an American party; that it is a party that wants America
to win the war, and of course they were fighting for aid to the Soviet
Union.
Browder made his speech, wrote his book on Teheran, and they
completely — in the South they abolished the Communist Party com-
pletely. I was told this personally, that the reason they abolished
the Communist Party in the South is because the Democratic Con-
gressmen from the South, especially in the Senate, controlled all the
main appropriation committees and had the most important com-
mittees that were necessary for aid to the Soviet Union. As long as
they had a Communist Party in the South and anything would
happen — Negroes fighting for their rights — the Communists would
be accused of it, and in this way the Southern Democrats would oppose
opening the second front through Europe and giving more aid to
the Soviet Union. So they abolished the party in the South.
COIVIMUNIST ACTR'ITIES EST THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3137
In the rest of America they set up this Communist Political Asso-
ciation, and it was nothing but a tactic of the party, but when the
back of the German Army was broken, thej got all our guns and
ships, and they were standing there near the Elbe in Germany in
the middle of Berlin, and then Duclos writes a letter. Stalin could
have written it, but he had Duclos write it because during that period
they also had abolished the Communist International. They said,
"We don't need it any more." Russia said, "We don't give directives
to the Communist Party throughout the world,'' and they abolished
that, so through their system they had an information center, the
Cominform. They liad Duclos, the leading French Communist and
one of the leading Communists of the world, write a letter to the
American Communists that Browder watered down Marxism and
Leninism ; that Browder was screwy if he thought that there could be
any peace between the capitalist class and the working class; that
Browder's idea that labor and management committees would sur-
vive was a lot of baloney ; that the question of the day is the revolution.
And so the Communists then went back again, see ; they changed their
line, and they went back to the national liberation of the Negro people.
They changed the organization, went back to the Communist Party.
They took the Young Communist League, the youth organization, and
made it the youth organization, and so forth.
Mr. DoTLE. I know, Mr. Rosser, that the practice of the Communist
Party and their fellow travelers is habitually to attack anyone who
appears before this committee who tries to help it, as you have. I want
to ask you this question, and again this is something I haven't asked
you about, and I haven't asked you anything else about which you
have testified here today : You are not in the employ of this com-
mittee ; are you ?
Mr. RossER. Oh, no.
Mr. Doyle. Never have been ?
Mr. Rosser. No.
Mr. Doyle. Were you offered any emolument or anything of value,
either directly or indirectly, in order to come here and help this com-
mittee today ?
Mr. RossER. No, no.
Mr. Doyle. That is all, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Velde. I think, Mr. Rosser, that my colleagues have already
summed up the knowledge that you have brought forth today regard-
ing your activities in the Communist Party while you were a member.
It was very interesting to me todearn the motives which impelled
you to become a member of the Communist Party or the Young Com-
munist League in the first place and the motives which compelled
you to leave the Communist Party.
We have had a number of different reasons given to this committee
as to why persons, American citizens, have joined the Communist
Party and a number of different reasons why they have left.
Your very lucid dissertation on that particular subject is extremely
valuable to this committee because we are planning to issue a booklet
on the subject-matter which you have just discussed, the reasons that
American citizens joined the' Communist Party and the reasons that
they left the Communist Party.
3138 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
I want to join with my colleagues, too, in tlianljing you for appear-
ing here before this committee and giving the valuable information
to the committee which will assist it in recommending remedial legis-
lation to handle the problems of the Communist conspiracy.
In order that you might be within the jurisdiction of the United
States Congress, your subpena will be continued until further notice.
At this time you are dismissed with the committee's thanks.
Call the next witness.
Mr. Jackson. Mr. Chairman, I see that there has entered the hear-
ing room one of our colleagues of the House of Re]U'esentatives, the
Honorable John J, Allen, Jr. I think the committee should be aware
of that.
Mr. Velde. We certainly want to welcome you here, Mr. Allen. If
you don't have a chair and want to come and sit down here, you are
certainly welcome.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Donald Niven Wheeler.
Mr. Velde. In the testimony you are about to give before this sub-
committee do you solemnly swear that you will tell the truth, the
whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?
Mr. Wheeler. I do.
TESTIMONY OF DONALD NIVEN WHEELER, ACCOMPANIED BY HIS
COUNSEL, GEORGE ANDERSEN
Mr. Tavenner. Wliat is your name, please, sir ?
Mr. Wheeler. Donald Wheeler.
Mr. Ta\tenner. Do you have a middle name ?
Mr. Wheeler. Yes ; Niven, N-i-v-e-n.
Mr. Tavenner. Are you accompanied by counsel, Mr. Wheeler?
Mr. Wheeler. Yes, sir.
Mr. TA^^NNER. Will counsel please identify himself for the record ?
Mr. Andersen. George Andersen.
Mr. Tavenner. Your address, please ?
Mr. Andersen. 240 Montgomery.
Mr. Tavenner. When and where were you born, Mr. Wlieeler ?
Mr. Wheeler. Wliite Bluffs, Wash.
Mr. Tavenner. "Wliat date ?
Mr. Wheeler. October 23, 1913.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you give the committee, please, a statement of
your formal educational training ?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I attended grade school in White Bluffs, Wash.;
high school in Woodland, Wash., "Wliite Bluffs, and Seattle. I at-
tended Reed College in Portland, Oreg.
Mr. Tavenner. Wlien did you finish your work at Reed College ?
Mr. Wheeler. In 1935, and I attended Oxford University in
1935-37 and the University of Paris.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you speak a little louder, please, sir ?
Mr. Wheeler. The University of Paris from 1937-38, as I recall.
Mr. Tavenner. Does that complete your educational training ?
Mr. Wheeler. Yes, sir.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you tell the committee, please, how you have
been employed since the completion of your educational training in
1938?
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES EST THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3139
(At this point Mr. T-Nriieeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that question, sir, under the privi-
lege of the fifth amendment.
Mr. Jackson. Mr. Counsel, would you repeat the question, please?
1 am sorry, I didn't get it.
Mr. Tavenner. The question was this : Will you state to the commit-
tee what your employment has been since the completion of your edu-
cation in 1938?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Tavenner. What was the first position that you took after leav-
ing school in Paris ?
Mr. Wheeler. Well, sir, I refuse to answer that on the ground
mentioned earlier.
Mr. Jackson. Is it the contention of the witness that a true answer
to that question, as to all of the employment since his graduation from
college, a true answer, would be incriminating?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I have already answered that question, sir.
Mr. Jackson. You decline to answer ?
Mr. Wheeler. Yes, sir.
Mr. Doyle. Mr. Chairman, may I ask this question of the witness :
Have you been employed since 1 938 ?
(At this point Mr. l^Hieeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. Same answer, sir.
Mr. Doyle. Have you been receiving charity since 1938 in any
form ?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir.
Mr. Doyle. Have you independent sources of income so it hasn't
been necessary for you to be employed since 1938 ?
Mr. Wheeler. Well, sir, I refuse to answer that on the ground
mentioned earlier.
Mr. Scherer. Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Velde. Mr. Scherer.
Mr. Scherer. I ask that you direct the witness to answer first the
two questions that were asked by Mr. Tavenner, and then as many as
were asked by Mr. Doyle that you see fit so that the record may be
clear.
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Velde. I would like to do that one at a time. Of course I can
see no reason why the witness should refuse to answer any of the ques-
tions that have been asked by counsel or Mr. Doyle. I see no reason
why they would tend to incriminate you in any way.
So far as the question, can you repeat the question that you asked,
or shall we have the court reporter read it ?
Mr. Tavenner. No; I can repeat it. The first question was this:
Will you state to the committee, please, how you have been employed
since you completed your educational training in Paris in 1938 ?
Mr. Wheeler. My answer to that, sir, is that I refuse to answer
on the grounds of possible incrimination.
Mr. Scherer. Now, Mr. Chairman
Mr. Velde. You are directed to answer that question.
(At this point Mr. Wlieeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
3140 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
Mr. Wheeler. I decline to answer on the basis of the fifth amend-
ment ; I refuse to be a witness against myself.
Mr. Velde. Will you proceed with the next question, Mr. Counsel ?
Mr. Ta\T']Nner. My next question was, Wliat was the first employ-
ment which you accepted after leaving Paris in 1938 ?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. Same answer.
Mr. Velde. That is, you refuse to answer ?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer.
Mr. Velde. You are directed to answer that particular question, Mr.
Witness.
Mr. Tavenner. Were you student or professor at Yale University
in 1938 or 1939 after leaving Paris, France?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that question on the ground
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Ta\^nner. I suggest, Mr. Chairman, that the witness be di-
rected to answer the question.
Mr. Velde. Yes, as I said before, there is no possible way in the
Chair's opinion or in the opinion of the members of the committee
that that can incriminate you, so you are directed to answer the
question.
Mr. Wheeler. May I hear the question again, please?
Mr. Tavenner. Will you read the question, please?
(The question was read by the reporter as follows: "Were you
student or professor at Yale University in 1938 or 1939 after leaving
Paris, France?")
]\Ir. Wheeler. I wasn't professor at Yale.
Mr. Tavenner. You were a professor ?
Mr. Wheeler. I w^as not a professor, no.
Mr. Tavenner. Were you instructor at Yale University?
Mr. Wheeler. Yes, sir.
IMr. Tavenner. During what years were you instructor ?
Mr. Wheeler. 1938 and 1939.
Mr. Tavenner. What was the field in which you occupied the
position of an instructor?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. Government.
Mr. Tavenner. Government?
Mr. Wheeler. Yes.
Mr. Tavenner. How long did you say you were instructor at Yale ?
Mr. Wheeler. One year.
Mr. Tavenner. That was from the fall of 1938 to the summer of
1939, is that correct?
Mr. Wheeler. Yes, sir.
Mr. Tavenner. During the period of your instructorship at Yale
were you affiliated with the Teacher's Union, Federation of Teachers
Union, American Federation of Labor?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that question on the grounds
mentioned earlier.
Mr. Scherer. Well, Mr. Chairman, I can't possibly see, if this
witness is affiliated with the Teachers' Union, the American Federa-
tion of Labor, how that could possibly incriminate him, and I am
going to ask yoU to direct him to answer that question.
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3141
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with ISIr. Andersen.)
Mr. Velde. Yes, the Chair concurs, and you are directed to answer
that question.
Mr. ScHERER. I think the record should show that the witness sits
mute.
Mr. Velde. The record will so indicate.
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that question on the grounds
mentioned earlier.
Mr. Tavenner. After leaving Yale University did you accept a
position in Washington ?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr, Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir, on the ground of pos-
sible self-incrimination.
Mr. DoTLE. Mr. Chairman, may I ask this question of the gentle-
man: Wliat professional societies were you a member of while you
were at Yale ; that is, professional societies ?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Velde. Fraternities ?
Mr. Doyle. Yes, fraternities, or intellectual groups or study groups ;
any.
Mr. Wheeler. I don't recall being a member of any professional
groups.
Mr. Doyle. Were you ever a member of Phi Beta Kappa ?
Mr. Wheeler. No.
Mr. Doyle. Any other scholastic societies?
Mr. Wheeler. I don't recall any.
Mr. Doyle. Well, think a minute. I am asking you a fair question.
I don't think it would incriminate you if you stated being a member of
any professional society, would it ?
(At this point, Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Doyle. Don't you recall, or were you ever a member of any
society as a result of your having won your degree ?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. Do you just mean at Yale University ?
Mr. Doyle. Yale or later.
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I don't remember any such organizs tion.
Mr. Doyle. You have no recollection then, I understand, of your
ever having joined any scholarship group or professional gi'oup to
which you were entitled to become a member as a result of being a
graduate of the University of Paris or instructor at Yale?
]\Ir. Wheeler. I don't remember any such, sir.
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. May I ask, do you mean while I was at Yale Uni-
versity ?
Mr. Doyle. Well, the import of my question, sir, is this : You are
n graduate of the University of Paris; you were instructor at Yale
University. Now, I am merely wondering what professional or schol-
arship groups, honorary societies, intellectual societies, you were a
member of as a result of your achievements in scholarship.
Mr. Wheeler. I can't remember a single one, sir.
3142 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
Mr. Doyle. All right.
Mr. Jackson. Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Velde. Mr. Jackson.
Mr. Jackson. Were you ever, let us say, a member of the Elks?
(At this point Mr. Wlieeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. No, sir.
Mr. Jackson. Any service clubs such as Rotary, Lions, Kiwanis?
Mr. Wheeler. Not that I recall.
Mr. Jackson. German-American Bund?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. Is that asked as a serious question ?
Mr. Jackson. That is asked as a serious question.
(At this point Mr. "Wlieeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. The answ^er is no.
Mr. Jackson. Silver Shirts?
Mr. Wheeler. No.
Mr. Jackson. Communist Party?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that on the grounds of possible
self-incrimination.
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Wheeler, according to the Los Angeles Times
of November 18, 1953, there was testimony before a committee of
the Senate in which there was read into evidence a letter from Mr.
J. Edgar Hoover, Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation,
addressed to General Vaughn, in which it is said :
The Bureau's information at this time indicates that the following persons
were participants in this oj)eration or were utilized by principals in this ring
for the purpose of obtaining data in which the Soviet is interested.
Among those named is the name of Donald Wlieeler, formerly with
the Office of Strategic Services, and then on the same day I find in
the San Francisco, Call-Bulletin of AVednesday, November 18
(At this point Mr. Wlieeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Tavenner (continuing). A news article datelined Portland,
Oreg., November 18, 1953, which reads as follows :
Donald Niven Wheeler, named yesterday by FBI Director .T. Ed?ar Hoover
as once a spy suspect, said the allegation was entirely false and malicious.
Did you make the statement attributed to you that the allegation
of Mr. Hoover w^as entirely false and malicious?
Mr. Wheeler. Well, may I see that paper ?
Mr. Taatenner. Yes, sir. I offer the paper in evidence, Mr. Chair-
man, and ask that it be marked "Donald Niven Wheeler Exhibit
No. 1."'
Mr. Velde. Do you ask that it be introduced into the record ?
Mr. Tavenner. Yes, sir.
Mr. Velde. Without objection it will be admitted into the record at
this point.
(News article from San Francisco Call-Bulletin of Wednesday,
November 18, 1953, was received in evidence as Donald Niven Wheeler
Exhibit No. 1.)
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3143
DONALD NIVEN WHEELER EXHIBIT NO. 1
[From San Francisco Call-Bulletin, November 18, 1953]
Dairy Farmer Scores Listing as Spy Suspect
Portland, Oreg., November 18 (AP). — Donald Niven Wheeler, named yester-
day by FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover as once a spy suspect, said the allegation
was "entirely false and malicious."
Wheeler, who lives on a dairy farm in Sequim, Wash., was reported by the
Portland Oregonian as saying:
"Possibly the Republicans think the spy scare will take the public mind off
the administration's problems such as the present depression in agriculture,
the slump in foreign trade, and other current difficulties."
Wheeler's name was 1 of 12 mentioned as possible Soviet spies in a letter
introduced as testimcmy in a Senate Internal Security Subcommittee hearing
on the Harry Dexter White case.
Wheeler was identified in testimony as formerly with the Office of Strategic
Services.
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that question.
Mr. Tavenner. You refuse to state whether or not you were cor-
rectly reported in the news article bearing your name ?
Mr, Wheeler. I refuse on the grounds of the fifth amendment.
JNIr. Tavenner. Well, was the statement true, or was it false?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir, on the same grounds.
Mr. Tavenner. Were you employed in the Treasury Department or
in the Office of Strategic Services at any time ?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir, on the same ground.
Mr, Tavenner. While you were at school at Oxford, England, was
there an organization in the school attended by you known as the
Young Communist League of England?
(At this point Mr, Wheeler conferred with Mr, Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler, I refuse to answer that, sir, on the same ground.
Mr. Tavenner. Were you affiliated in any manner with a branch
of the Young Communist School of England or any other branch of
the Qommunist Party while attending school at Oxford?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that on the same ground.
Mr. Ta\^nner, I want to correct my question to read "Young Com-
munist League of England" instead of "Young Communist School of
England." Does that change your answer in any way ?
Mr. Wheeler. No; same answer, sir.
Mr. Velde. You did have a Khodes scholarship to Oxford, did you
not?
(At this point Mr, Wlieeler conferred with Mr, Andersen,)
Mr, Wheeler, Yes, sir,
Mr. Velde. During what years did you attend under that Rhodes
scholarship ?
Mr. Wheeler. Around 1935 to 1938.
Mr. Tavenner. Did you affiliate with the Communist Party of the
United States at any time after 1938?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that for the reason mentioned
earlier.
Mr, Tavenner, Are you familiar Avith the testimony taken before
this committee in 1948 when Elizabeth Bentley was a witness?
(At this point Mr, Wheeler conferred with Mr, Andersen,)
3144 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
Mr. Wnr^ELER. No, sir.
Mr. Tavenner. Did you not make a reply to the testimony at the
time her testimony was made public in which you denied the truthful-
ness of Miss Bentley's statement ?
(At this point Mr. Wlieeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. Will you repeat the question, please ?
Mr. Tavenner. Did you not deny in the public press, upon the re-
lease of the testimony of Miss Bentley, that her statements were true?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that for the reason mentioned
earlier.
Mr. Tavenner. Miss Bentley, in testifying before this committee,
described what was known as the Perlo group of the Communist
Party, and after having so testified, was asked various questions by
Mr. Stripling, then senior investigator for this committee, and made
the replies which I will read :
Mr. Stripling. Did Victor Perlo turn information over to you?
Miss Bentlet. Yes, he did.
Mr. Stripling. Information wliich had been obtained from x>eople who were
employed in the Government?
Miss Bentlet. Yes ; he or members of his group turned it over, yes.
Mr. Stripling. Could you name otlier members of his group before we go on
with the Silvermaster ^ group?
Miss Bentley. Yes, I will try to remember them. Allan Rosenberg.
Mr. Stripling. Do you know where he was employed?
Miss Bentley. Yes, sir ; he was with the FEA.
Mr. Stripling. In what?
Miss Bentley. I don't know what those initials are.
Mr. Stripling. Was it the Board of PZconomic Warfare?
Miss Bentley. It was originally BEW, but then it became FEA, Foreign Eco-
nomic Administration. It was an amalgamation, I understand, of several
agencies.
Mr. Stripling. Can you name any other member of the group ?
Miss Bentley. Donald Wheeler.
Mr. Stripling. Was that Donald Niven, N-i-v-e-n, Wheeler?
Miss Bentley. I don't know his middle name, I am sorry.
Mr. Stripling. Was it Donald or David?
Miss Bentley. Donald.
Mr. Stripling. Do you know where he was employed?
Miss Bentley. OSS.
Mr. Stripling. Office of Strategic Services?
Miss Bentley. That is correct.
Then Miss Bentley proceeded to name other members of the Perlo
group ; that is, other persons identified by her as members of the Perlo
group.
Then later on in the testimony Mr. Mundt, a member of this com-
mittee at that time, asked this question :
The two who were named just before Kramer, you neglected to ask if they were
Communists.
Mr. Stripling. Allan Rosenberg and Donald Wlheeler.
Miss Bentley. Yes, they were ; both of them were Communists.
Mr. Mundt. Both of them were Communists?
Miss Bentley. They were both Communists.
Then the testimony related to other individuals.
(At this point Mr. Wlieeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Tavenner. Were you acquainted with Elizabeth Bentley?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that for the reasons mentioned
earlier.
* Reference to Nathan Gregory Silvermaster.
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3145
Mr. Velde. How could the acquaintanceship with any person in-
criminate you in any way ?
(At this point Mr. Wlieeler conferred with Mr, Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I have already answered the question, sir.
Mr. Velde. By your refusal to answer ; is that right ? You say that
you answered the question by your refusal to answer ; is that correct ?
Mr. Wheeler. Yes, sir; I refuse on the ground mentioned earlier.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Wheeler, I again call your attention to addi-
tional testimony by Miss Bentley :
Mr. Stripling. Going now to the Perlo espionage group, who turned the ma-
terial over that that group collected?
Miss Bentley. I did not quite get that.
Mr. Stripling. Who was it in the Perlo group who turned the material over
to you?
Miss Bentley. Well, it depends ; whoever was coming to New York on busi-
ness or to see their family or was selected came up.
Mr. Stripling. In other words, you did not come to Washington for the pur-
pose of collecting information from the Perlo group?
Miss Bentley. No, I did not.
Mr. Stripling. Only the Silvermaster group?
Miss Bentley. Yes, that is correct.
Did you at any time travel between Washington and New York for
the purpose of meeting with Miss Bentley or any other person acting
for her ?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that question for the reason men-
tioned earlier.
Mr. Tavenner. Were you acquainted with John Abt?
(At this point Mr. Wlieeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that for the reason mentioned
earlier,
Mr. Tavenner. Did you at any time visit in the apartment of John
Abt in New York?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that for the reason mentioned
earlier.
Mr. Tavenner. Continuing with the testimony :
Mr. Stripling. Who in the Perlo group?
Miss Bentley. Well, I met Victor Perlo, Harry Magdoff, Edward Fitgerald,
Charley Kramer, and Donald Wheeler, Allan Rosenberg.
Mr. Stripling. Where did you meet these people, do you recall? Did you
have a regular meeting?
Miss Bentley. Yes, I first met them, at least the four I first mentioned, I met
the first time in Mr. Abt's apartment on Central Park West.
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Tavenner. Did you ever meet Miss Bentley in John Abt's
apartment ?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that for the reason mentioned
earlier.
Mr. Tavenner. Major Duncan Lee was a witness before the com-
mittee, and he denied any knowledge of Communist Party member-
ship on your part. In the course of his examination this question
was asked:
Did he-
meaning Mr. Wheeler —
ever tell you that he belonged to three organizations which the Attorney General
said were subversive organizations?
41002— 54— pt. 1 7
3146 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
Mr. Lee. No, sir ; he never did.
Mr. Stripling. He admitted, Mr. Chairman, before the Civil Service Com-
mission, February 12, 1942, that he was a member of the American League
for Peace and Democracy, the Washington Committee to Aid China, and the
Washington Book Shop, all of which were Communist-front organizations and
so found by the Attorney General.
Did you make such an admission before the Civil Service Com-
mission ?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that on the ground mentioned
earlier.
Mr. Tavenner. Were you given a hearing by the Civil Service
Commission on any matter involving your loyalty ?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that on the ground mentioned
earlier.
Mr. Scherer. Isn't that a matter of record, Mr. Counsel, that he was
given a hearing before the Civil Service Commission ?
Mr. Tavenner. I am not certain whether it is a matter of public
record or not, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Scherer. I can't see how that would incriminate him, whether
lie had a hearing. We could find that out.
Mr. Tavenner. As a matter of fact, you were given a clearance
by the Civil Service Commission, were you not, and you were con-
tinued in Government employment?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir, on the ground that I
mentioned earlier.
Mr. Velde. I can see no way it would incriminate you by getting a
clearance from the Civil Service Commission, and so I direct you to
answer the question.
Mr. Scherer. Maybe it was one of those phony clearances, Mr.
Chairman, that we hear so much about. Apparently that is the
case.
Mr. Velde. Upon direction do you still refuse to answer the question ?
Mr. Wheeler. I do, sir, for the reason mentioned earlier.
Mr. Tavenner. Were you a member of the American League for
Peace and Democracy ?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir, for tlie reason mentioned
earlier.
Mr. Tavenner. Were you a member at any time of the Washington
Committee to Aid China ?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that for the same reason.
Mr. Tavennes. Were you a member at any time of the Washington
Book Shop?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that for the same reason.
Mr. Tavenner. Upon obtaining Federal employment did you exe-
cute what is known as form number 375 in which point 15 was a
question which read as follows :
Are you a member of any Commxmist or German Bund organization or any
political party or organization which advocates the overthrow of our consti-
tutional form of government in the United States, or do you have membership
in or affiliation with any group, association, or organization which advocates
or lends support to any organization or government advocating the overthrow
of our constitutional form of government in the United States?
to which you answered, "No."
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3147
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir, for the reason mentioned
earlier.
Mr. Tavenner. I have information that such a form was executed
by you on October 3, 1941, and that you did answer "No" to such a ques-
tion. Had you at that time or were you at that time a member of
any Communist or German Bund organization ?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir, for the reason mentioned
earlier.
Mr. Tavenner. Were you a member of any Communist organiza-
tion at that time, October 3, 1941 ?
Mr. Wpieeler. I refuse to answer that for the reason given.
Mr. Jackson. I think the record should show that the witness will-
ingly answered the question as to whether or not he was a member.
Mr. Velde. Let the record so show.
Mr. Tavenner. The information of the committee is that before
you were employed in the OSS, you were employed in the Treasury
Department of the United States, is that correct ?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir, for the reason mentioned
earlier.
Mr. Scherer. If the chairman please, I would suggest that you
direct the witness to answer whether he was employed in the Treasury
Department. How can that incriminate him ?
Mr. Velde. Yes; again the Chair concurs. There is no way that
you can possibly be incriminated by your answer to that question,
so you are directed to answer the question.
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer the question on the ground
mentioned earlier.
Mr. Tavenner. The information of the committee is that in your
form No. 375, bearing date of October 3, 1941, there is this statement
with regard to your employment between April 1939 and May 1940 :
Washington, D. C. United States Treasury, Division of Monetary Research.
Monetary economic analyst : Conducting research and preparing reports and
memoranda on monetary and economic subjects and on other subjects for the
use of the Secretary of the Treasury.
Is that correct?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir, for the reason mentioned
earlier.
Mr. Tavenner. What position did Harry Dexter White hold in the
Treasury Department at that time, between April 1939 and May 1940 ?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir, for the reason mentioned
earlier.
Mr. Tavenner. Were you acquainted with Harry Dexter Wliite ?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir.
Mr. Tavenner. How did you obtain employment in the United
States Treasury Department?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir.
Mr. Ta\'enner. Did you give references in seeking employment,
and if so, who were they ?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
3148 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir, for the reasons mentioned
earlier.
Mr. Tavenner. Did you deliver any classified information to Mr.
Perlo for delivery to another person ?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir, for the reasons men-
tioned earlier.
Mr. Tavenner. Did you deliver classified information while em-
ployed by the Government to any person unauthorized to receive the
same ?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir, for the reason mentioned
earlier.
Mr. Tavenner. Are you now a member of the Communist Party ?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir, for the reason mentioned
earlier,
Mr. Scherer. What is your employment at the present time?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir.
Mr. Scherer. Mr, Chairman, I ask you to direct the witness to
answer that question unless he is an espionage agent for the Eussian
Government at the present time. Then he could refuse to answer it.
Otherwise I think he should be directed to answer,
Mr. Velde. Yes, I can see no way your employment at the present
time would tend to incriminate you unless that were true. I don't
think you want the committee to believe that you are an espionage
agent at the present time, and I do therefore direct you to answer
the question.
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer for the reason given earlier.
Mr. Scherer. Did you have a hand in drafting what was later
known as the Morgenthau plan for Germany ?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir, for the reason given
earlier.
Mr, Tavenner, The heading of the press clipping under dateline
of Portland, Oreg., November 18, is "Dairy Farmer Scores Listing
As Spy Suspect." Was that a correct statement which appears in
Donald Niven Wheeler exhibit No. 1 ? Is that a correct statement of
your present employment?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler, I refuse to answer that, sir, for the reason mentioned
earlier.
Mr. Tavenner. Where do you now reside ?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. Sequim, Washington, S-e-q-u-i-m.
Mr. Tavenner. In the State of Washington ?
Mr, Wheeler, Yes, sir,
Mr. Tavenner, I have no further questions, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Velde. Mr. Jackson.
Mr. Jackson. What is your present profession or occupation, Mr.
Wheeler?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir, for the reasons I men-
tioned earlier.
Mr. Jackson. For purposes of adequate identification I think it is
essential that the question be answered. I ask the direction of the
Chair that he answer the question,
Mr. Velde. Yes, you are directed again to answer that question.
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES IN THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3149
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse on the grounds I mentioned earlier.
Mr. Jackson. I have no further questions, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Velde. Mr. Scherer.
Mr. Scherer. I have no further questions.
Mr. Velde. Mr. Doyle.
Mr. Doyle. When you were a student at the University of Paris
or afterward did you travel to the Soviet Union ever ?
(At this point Mr. Wlieeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that question for the reason I
mentioned earlier.
Mr. Doyle. How many times did you travel there while you were
studying in France ?
(At this point Mr. Wlieeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I answered that question, sir.
Mr. Doyle. Did you study in Germany as well as in France while
you were a Rhodes scholar?
(At this point Mr. Wlieeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir, on the grounds I men-
tioned earlier.
Mr. Doyle. The Rhodes scholarship of which you were a bene-
ficiary is furnished by the United States Government; isn't it?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. The answer is "No, sir."
Mr. Doyle. It was furnished by Cecil Rhodes, wasn't it, an English-
man? Is that the scholarsliip under which you attended the Uni-
versity of Paris?
(At this point Mr. Wlieeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I believe so, sir.
Mr. Doyle. Now that you remember that so clearly, is your memory
clear as to whether or not you were a member of any professional
society as a result of your scholarship attainments, or don't you still
remember ?
Mr. Wheeler. I don't remember any. I don't believe that I was
a member of any.
Mr. Doyle. Are you now a member of any such society ?
Mr. Wheeler. No, sir.
Mr. Doyle. Have you ever been ?
Mr. Wheeler. I don't remember ever being a member of any pro-
fessional society.
Mr. Doyle. Wliat was your classification as a civil-service em-
ployee of the United States Government?
(At this point Mr. Wlieeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir, for the reason men-
tioned earlier.
Mr. Scherer. I am going to ask again, Mr. Chairman, that he be
directed to answer that question.
Mr. Velde. Yes ; I can see no reason why the answer to that question
would tend to incriminate you, so you are directed to answer the ques-
tion.
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that for the reason mentioned
earlier.
Mr. Doyle. Who was your direct superior while you were in the
employ of the United States Government in whatever department you
worked in ? What was his or her name ?
3150 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES EST THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir, for the reason mentioned
earlier.
Mr. Doyle. Wliat was your salary rate? What was your annual
compensation when you worked for the United States Government as a
civil-service employee ?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir.
Mr. Doyle. Are you now occupied in any business or profession for
which you were especially trained in your studies when you were a
Khodes scholar ?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir.
Mr. Velde. Mr. Tavenner, do you have any more questions?
Mr. Tavenner. Yes, I have another question.
Were you employed by the Senate Banking and Currency Com-
mittee beginning in May 1940, extending for 7 years thereafter?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that question, sir, for the reason
mentioned earlier.
Mr. Tax'enner. What is the basis of your contention that your em-
ployment by a Senate committee might tend to incriminate you ?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr, Wheeler. I stand on my earlier answer, sir,
Mr. Tavenner. I think I should state that it may possibly be my
duty to attempt to test whether or not your contention is based on any
real fear of self-incrimination as a result of answering such a question.
Mr, Jackson. Mr. Chairman, in light of counsel's statement, I ask
that the witness be directed to answer that question.
Mr. Velde. The Chair concurs, and you are directed to answer the
question.
(At this point Mr. Wlieeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. Kepeat the question, please.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you read it, please ?
(The question was read by the reporter as follows:)
Were you employed by the Senate Banking and Currency Committee beginning
in May 1940, extending for 7 years thereafter?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I stand on the fifth amendment and will not be a
witness against myself.
Mr. Tavenner. In other words, you refuse to give to this committee
any information which might enable them to come to the conclusion as
to whether you have any real basis of fear of self-incrimination to
answer such a question ?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I stand on my earlier answer, sir.
Mr. Tavenner. Were you employed by Senator Wagner, who was
then the chairman of that committee?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that for the reason given a moment
ago.
Mr. Jackson. Were you ever in Washington, D. C. ?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir.
Mr. Scherer. I ask that you direct him to answer that question.
Mr. Velde. Yes ; certainly you are directed to answer that question.
I don't think it could possibly incriminate you to be in Washington,
D. C. ; otherwise there would be a lot of us sitting up here in danger
of being incriminated, and therefore you are directed to answer the
question.
COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES EST THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA 3151
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer on the grounds mentioned a mo-
ment ago.
Mr. Taatennek. Was not the Senate Banking and Currency Com-
mittee between May 1940 and 1941 or 1942 engaged in conducting an
investigation to ascertain facts to present to Congress as a basis for
legislation?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir, for the reasons mentioned
earlier.
Mr. Tavenner. To answer the question of your knowledge of that
you seriously contend might tend to incriminate you ?
Mr. Wheeler. I stand on the answer I gave a moment ago.
Mr. Tavenner. Actually, Mr. Wheeler, you have just determined
that you will not answer any question that this committee desires to
ask you, isn't that the fact ?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Tavenner. Will you answer that, please ?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. Well, sir, I am answering these questions to the best
of my ability on the advice of counsel, and I repeat the answer I gave
you a moment ago — I refuse to answer for the reasons given some time
ago.
Mr. ScHERER. Were you passing any information to the Russian
Government at the time you were working for the Senate Banking
Committee ?
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir, on the grounds mentioned
earlier.
Mr. Velde. Do you have anything more, Mr. Counsel ?
Mr. Tavenner. No.
Mr. Jackson. Mr. Chairman, may I comment that I do not believe
that the question asked by the gentleman from Ohio was at all far-
fetched in the face of sworn testimony that the witness who is before
us today did exactly that. It may be a very humorous matter to
some, but there is some very serious testimony on record.
Mr. Velde. Let me add, Mr. Jackson and members of the committee
that this witness' testimony
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Velde (continuing). Or rather, refusal to testify can only lead
any reasonable man to believe that you must be engaged in some ne-
farious activities at the present time, some criminal activities at the
present time.
(Representative Donald L. Jackson left the hearing room at this
point.)
Mr. Velde. I suppose it would be futile to ask you any further
questions relating to your Communist Party membership or espionage
activities as claimed by Miss Bentley, but let me ask you this one
question, and I wish you would consider answering it : Do you con-
sider yourself at the present time to be a loyal American citizen ?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Scherer. Does he have to ask counsel whether he should
answer that question?
Mr. Velde. Well, of course, Mr. Scherer, the witness has a right to
confer with counsel.
3152 COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES EST THE SAN FRANCISCO AREA
Mr. ScHERER. I mean, whether he is a loyal American citizen ?
Mr. Wheeler. Are you asking me my opinion of my own status in
the community?
Mr. Velde. Yes.
Mr. Wheeler. My opinion is I certainly am.
Mr. Velde. I ask you then if you are a loyal American citizen, don't
you feel it is your duty to give information about the Soviet con-
spiracy, the Soviet espionage system that has been operating in this
country ?
(Representative Donald L. Jackson returned to the hearing room at
this point.)
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. Well, sir, you have the power of Congress here, and
I don't care to get into a political argument with you. I will answer
your questions, however, to the best of my ability.
Mr. Jackson. Have you answered the questions of the committee
to the best of your ability ?
(At this point Mr. Wlieeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I have, and as I have been advised.
Mr. Velde. Let me ask you then this question: Do you consider
that you were a loyal American citizen during the time that you knew
Miss Bentley ?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. Well, sir, it seems to me that question is one of the
"Have you stopped beating your wife" type of questions.
Mr. Velde. Well, will you answer the question ?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. If you will break it up into its component parts, I
will answer the component parts.
Mr. Jackson. What was the date on which Miss Bentley testified?
Mr. ScHERER. About his activities?
Mr. Velde. Let me ask the question this way: Did you consider
yourself between 1940 and 1945 to be a loyal American citizen?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. My opinion, sir, is that I was.
Mr. Velde. Then will you answer the question and give the com-
mittee of Congress the information : Did you pass any papers, secret
papers, to Elizabeth Bentley ?
(At this point Mr. Wheeler conferred with Mr. Andersen.)
Mr. Wheeler. I refuse to answer that, sir, for the grounds men-
tioned earlier.
Mr. Velde. Let me make this final observation, that your refusal
to testify about matters affecting the security of this Nation to which
you claim to be loyal certainly does point up the need for additional
security legislation.
Is there any reason why this witness should be detained further,
Mr. Counsel?
Mr. Tavenner. No, sir.
Mr. Velde. If not, the witness is dismissed, and the committee will
stand in adjournment until tomorrow morning at 9 : 30.
( Whereupon, at 5 : 20 p. m., the hearing was recessed until 9 : 30
a. m.j Wednesday, December 2, 1953.)
X
INDEX
Individuaxs
Faee
AM, John 3145
Alberga, Laurence 3065
Alex, T 3077, 3081
Alexander, Hersehel 3124
Aller, P 3077, 3078, 3081
Andersen, George 3138-3152
Anderson, George 3077, 3081
Ashby, G 3113
Austin, Kenneth 3130
Ayeroff, Joe 3125
Baker, Donald 3125
Balog, Lester 3077, 3078, 3081
Baron, Lou 31 29
Barrymore, Ethel 3065
Bass, Charlotta 3118, 3121
Bearden, Bessye 3065
Bentley, Elizabeth 3143-3145, 3152
Bergman, G 3078
Bittelman, Alexander 3088
Black, Elaine 3077, 3081
Bloor, Mother 3113
Boudreau, Ed 3075, 3079
Branch, James 3075, 3076, 3078, 3079, 3082
Bransten, Louise . 3090
Brant, Carl 3060, 3061
Brazil, Comrade 3113
Bridges, Harry 3095
Browder, Earl 3069, 3072, 3113, 3124, 3137
Brown, Archie 3130
Brown, Tom 3129
Bryan, Al 3059
Bryson, Hugh 3112, 3130
Buck, Tim 3113
Burford, Jim 3125
Butler, Mary 3113
Casimir, R 3077, 3081
Cayton, Revels 3112, 3120, 3130
Charles, Andy 3089
Chasson, Bob 1 3089
Cline, Paul 3059
Cole, Bob 3089, 3113
Corngold, Libby 3060, 3061
Corona, Bert 3124
Counts, George S 3065
Cowley, Malcolm 3065
Crawford, M 3113
Crowford, M. H 3078, 3083
Crawford, Matthew (Matt) 3064-3066, 3069, 3070
Criley, Dick 3112, 3113
Cutler, Emma 3113
Dana, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow 3065
Darcy, Sam 3076, 3078, 3079. 3083
Davis, Harold 3077, 3081
3153
3154 INDEX j
I
Page i
Davis, William H 3065
Dawson 3124
Dell, Floyd 3065
Diaz, Jose 3113
Dimitroff 3100
Diner, Sam 3078, 3083
Dobbs, Ben 3135
Domingo, W. A 3065
Don, Comrade 3113
Dougherty, Romeo L 3065
Duarte 3123
Duclos 3136,3137
Dunning, C 3078, 3083
Ellisberg, Benjamin 3078, 3083
Fidiam, J 3077, 3078, 3081
Fitgerald, Edward 3145-
Ford, James W 3087, 3113
Foster, William Z 3113
Frank, Waldo 3065
Gallngher, Leo 3078, 3084
Gallin, Roland 3065
Gannett, Betty 3129
Gardner, Helen 3059
Garner, Sylvia 3065
Garrison. A 3077. 3081
Gates, Johnny 3135
Gellert, Hugo 3065
Geoffrin, G 3078, 3083
George, Harrison 3113
Gerber, Serrill 3089, 3096
Germanie, Comrade 3113
Goldblatt, Louis (Lou) 3095,3096,3098
Goodman, Esther 3078, 3082
Goodwin, Sam 3075, 3079
Gordon, Charles 3075, 3079
Green, Gil 3113, 3134
Grossman, Aubrey 3096
Hama, Carl 3076, 3080
Hammond, John H., Jr 3065
Hanoff, E 3113
Harris, Ed 3078, 3083
Haywood, Harry 3132
Hedley, Dave 3122, 3123
Heide, Paul 3130
Hendricks, Frank 3122
Hickey, Neil 3076, 3078, 3080, 3084
Higman, Nell 3078, 3082
Hill, Leonard 3065
Hill, Preston 3125
Himelstein, Dave 3060, 3061
Hood, Dean 3125, 3129
Hoover, J. Edgar 3142, 3143
Hope, Cecil 3065
Hudson, Roy 3087, 3088, 3112, 3113
Hughes, Langston 3065, 3078, 3083
Hull, Morgan 3084, 3086, 3116
Jackson, Harry 3078, 3083, 3129
Jenkins, Katherine 3065
Johnson, Hall 3065
Johnson, Manning 3069
Jones, Mildred 3065
Kaplan, Al 3124
Keivetz, Jules 3125
Kinkead, Beatrice 3078, 3083
Kirby, Emmett 3076, 3077, 3079, 3081
Kline, Paul 3105, 3112, 3113, 3121
Kramer, Charles (Charley) 3144, 3145
INDEX 3155
Page
Kuusinen 3113
Laborde, Comrade 3113
LaPasionara 3113
Lee, Duncan 3145
Lehman, Lloyd 3129
Lewis, Juanita 3065
Lewis, Mollie 3065
Lewis, Thurston McNairy 3065
Lightner 3102
Lvnden, Richard (Dick) 3123, 3129
Magdoff, Harry 3145
Marsh, Al 3113
Maurer, George 3113
Max, Alan 3065
McClendon, Rose 3065
McGenty, Leona 3060, 3061
McKee, K 3077, 3080
McKenzie, Allen 3065
McNab, M 3078
McNamara, J. B 3113
Miller, Lewis (Lew) 3095
Miller, Loren 3065
Mindel, Pop 3072, 3087
Minor, Robert (Bob) 3087, 3090, 3116
Monjar, Elsie 3115
Montero, Frank C 3065
Montgomery, Jack 3123
Moon, Henry Lee 3064, 3065
Moon, Lee 3066
Mooney, Tom 3113
Moore, Fred 3078, 3082
Morgenthau 3148
Morris, George 3076, 3078, 3079, 3083
Moyer, Al 3113
Mundt, Mr 3144
Murphy, Maurice 3115
Nelson, Margaret 3060, 3061
Nelson, Steve 3061, 3089
Nelson, William 3060
Newman, Mort 3115
Nishi, Conrade 3113
O'Connor, Oleta (see also Oleta O'Connor Yates) 3113
Olgin, M. J 3093, 3094
Olsen, Jack 3080, 3102, 3130
Olson, Jack 3076
Orr, Violet 3076, 3079
Otto, P 3078
Palola, A 3078, 3083
Parra, LeRoy 3062
Patterson, Lloyd 3065
Pelman, Matt ^ 3059, 3105, 3124
Perlo, Victor 3144, 3145
Perry, Pettis 3059-3061, 3112, 3113, 3118, 3121, 3129, 3131, 3133, 3135
Peters, J 3063, 3070-3072, 3091
Pfeifer, Charlie 3124
Polkki, John 3125, 3129
Posey, Max 3122
Poston, Theodore R 3065
Potamkiu, Harry Allen 3065
Prestos, Comrade 3113
Proctor, Lyle 3125
Ralston, D 3113
Rand, Jean 3075, 3079
Randolph 3118
Randolph W I__~~I~~~~3078, 3083
3156 INDEX
Page
Reed, Cora 3077, 3080
Reddock, Arcus 3113
Rexroth, K 3077, 3081
Rhodes, Cecil 3149
Richardson, E 3113
Roberts, E 3075, 3079
Roberts, Jack 3077, 3081
Roosevelt 3099, 3116, 3118
Rosenberg, Allan 3144, 3145
Rosser, Louis (Lou) 3057-3137 (testimony)
Rosser, Mary Lou 3132
Rothstein, Ida 3078, 3082
Schneiderman, William 3105, 3112, 3113, 3120, 3124
Rudd, Wayland 3065
Salgade, Alice 3062
Sample. George 3065
Schneiderman, William 3064
•Schrier 3060, 3061
Seliger, Lloyd 3124
Sherman, Lou 3124
Silver, Max 3059, 3089, 3121
Silvermaster, Nathan Gregory 3144, 3145
Siskin, George 3072, 3087
Slagado, Comrade 3113
Smith, Homer 3065
Spector, Frank 3113
Stachel, Jack 3088, 3090
Stack, Walter 3112, 3113
Steffens, Lincoln 3078, 3083
Stevens, Alexander 3070
Stiller, George 3121
Stone, Martha 3085
Strack, Celeste 3089, 3096, 3135
Sugi, L 3078
Thaelmann, Ernest 3113
Thomas, Edna 3065
Thompson, Miss 3065
Thompson, Bob 3134
Thompson, L 3076, 3079
Thompson, Leo 3078
Thompson, Louise 3065, 3066
Thorez, Comrade 3113
Tichinin, Vladimir A 3077, 3080
Title, Sam 3060
Todd, Louise 3076, 3080, 3120
Toledano 3113
Tosh, Chu 3113
Tung, Mao Tse 3113
Unsinger, Harold F 3078, 3081, 3083
Utrich, Harry 3125
Vaughn, General 3142
Vodery, Will 3065
Wagner ( Senator) 3150
Walker, Charles Rumford 3065
Weeks, J. W 3078, 3082
Wennrick, Delda 3060
West, Dorothy 3065
Wheeler, Donald Niven (testimony) 3138-3152
Wheeler, Helen 3129
White, Constance 3065
White, Harry Dexter 3143, 3147
White, Walter 3118
Whiteman, Lovett 3064
Whitney, Anita 3078, 3083, 3112, 3113
Williams, G 3077, 3080
INDEX 3157
Fag»
Williams, Claudia 3125
Williams, Harold 3065
Williams, Harry 3057, 3130
Williams, Paul 3060-
Winston, Henry 3134
Winter, Ella 3078, 3083
Wintner, Frances 3060
Wood, Harry 3120
Yates, Al 3112.
Yates, Oleta O'Conner 3064, 3112
Young, Adele 3060, 3061
Young, Coyne 3125, 3129
Young, Doone 3065^
Young, Sam 31ia
Organizations
American Federation of Labor 3078, 3083, 3092, 3100, 3127, 3129, 3140
American League Against War and Fascism 309&
American League for Peace and Democracy 3146
American Newspaper Guild 3084, 3086, 3116, 3122
Army 3093, 3099
Auto Workers' International 3123
Board of Economic Warfare 3144
California Institute of Technology (Cal Tech) 3089, 3090
California Young Communist League 3058-
California Youth Legislature 3130
Christian Youth Council 3115
City College of Los Angeles 3089
Civil Service Commission 3146-
Civilian Conservation Corps 3099
Columbia University 3064, 3065
Cominform 3137
Communist International 3067, 3070, 3074, 3076, 3092, 3100, 3104, 3114, 3137
Communist International — Seventh World Conference 3100
Communist Youth International, First Congress 3076
Congress of Industrial Organizations 3085, 3105, 3110, 3117, 3120, 3122
ECCI 3099
Electrical Workers of America : 3061
Federal Bureau of Investigation 3131, 3133, 3142, 3143
Federation of Teachers 3140
First International 3076
Fishermen's Union 3122
Fordham University 3065
Foreign Economic Administration 3144
Fourth American Youth Congress 3107, 3108
Friends of Ethiopia 3101
Furniture Workers' Union 3122
German-American Bund 3142
Greek Workers Club 3078, 3082
Hall Johnson Negro Choir 1 3065
Howard Universitj^ 306&
International Longshoremen's and Warehousemen's Union 3095, 3122, 3123
International Workers Order of America 3066
International Youth Conference 307&
Longshoremen's Union 3122, 3126, 3130, 3133, 3134
Machinist Local No. 68, AFL 3078, 3083
Marine Cooks and Stewards 3112, 3129
Marine Workers 3078, 3082
Marine Workers Industrial Union 3078, 3082, 3083, 3129
Maritime Federation 3120
Methodist Youth 3115
National Association for the Advancement of Colored People 3115,
3118, 3121, 3125
National Guard 3093
National Negro Congress 3101, 3125
National Party Training School 3002
National Urban League 3065, 3066
3158 INDEX
Page
Navy 3093,3099
Needle Trades Workers Industrial Union 3078, 3082, 3083
North Beach Workers School 3078, 3082
Office of Strategic Service 3143, 3144, 3147
Ornamental Plasterers Union, AFL 3078, 3083
Oxford University 3138, 3143
Parent Teachers Association 3108
Reed College 3138
Roosevelt Committee on Fair Employment Practice 3117
Sacramento Junior College 3057
San Francisco Workers School 3074, 3075, 3078
Second International 3076
Second International Youth Movement 3076
Senate Banking and Currency Committee 3150, 3151
Silver Shirts 3142
Teachers' College, Columbia University 3065
Teachers' Union 3140
Trade Union Unity League 3076, 3078, 3084
Treasury Department 3143, 3147
United States Treasury, Division of Monetary Research 3147
United Student Peace Committee 3108
University of California 3090, 3112
University of California at Berkeley 3096
University of California at Los Angeles 3057, 3089
University of California Radiation Laboratory 3089
University of Paris 3138, 3141, 3149
University of Southern California 3089, 3090
Utilitv Workers' Union 3122
Warehousemen's Union 3122, 3124, 3130, 3132
Warehousemen's Union, Local 6 3080, 3123
Washington Book Shop 3146
Washington Committee to Aid China 3146
Workers' Alliance 3101, 3103
Workers' School 3111
Works Progress Administration 3101
Yale University 3140, 3141
Young Communist International 3080, 3100
Young Communist League 3057, 3058, 3062, 3063, 3076, 3077, 3079, 3080,
3084, 3086, 3089-3091, 3094-3096, 3098, 3100-3102, 3105, 3107, 3108,
3111, 3112, 3114, 3115, 3118, 3123, 3128-3130, 3134, 3135, 3137.
Young Communist League of California 3097
Young Communist League of England 3143
Young Communist League, Los Angeles 3080, 3108
Young Communist League, Los Angeles County 3062
Young Democrats 3108, 3114, 3125, 3126, 3135
Young Men's Christian Association 3114, 3115, 3125
Young Republicans 3114, 3126, 3135
Young Women's Christian Association 3063, 3084, 3085, 3086, 3125
Publications
Amsterdam News 3065
The California Eagle 3065, 3118
The Communist 3099
Daily People's World 3120, 3122, 3136
The League Lantern 3061-3063
Los Angeles Times 3142
New Frontiers 3058
New York Herald Tribune 3064
New York Times 3101
People's World 3124
San Francisco Call-Bulletin 3142, 3143
Two Decades of Progress 3058
Western Worker 3083
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